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CALIFORNIA 
ITS HISTORY AND ROMANCE 



CALIFORNIA 

ITS HISTORY AND ROMANCE 



BY 

JOHN S. M^GROARTY 



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ILLUSTRATED 



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LOS ANGELES 
GRAFTON PUBLISHING COMPANY 

1911 



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Copyright, 1911, by 

Grafton Publishing'Company 

Copyright, 1919, by 

Grafton Publishing Corporation 



Fif(h Edition 

To replace lost copy 
DEC 1 S 1935 



Press oi the 

Grafton Publishing Corporation 

Los Angeles 



GRATIAS 

IN the production of this book I am in- 
debted to many men and women who 
have written about California in books 
of their own. I am indebted, also, to many 
others who have not written, but whose 
sympathy and encouragement have been giv- 
en me without stint. I am greatly indebted, in 
an especial manner, to Charles F. Lummis, 
James Main Dixon, Rabbi Isidore Myers 
and Miss Anna McC. Beckley ; and I have to 
thank Allison Aylesworth who has been as 
my right hand from the first word to the 
last. 

The Author, 
los angeles, 

AUGUST 8, 1911. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. The Land oe Heart's Desire .... 3 

The physical beauty of California, the 
charm of its climate, the glory of 
hill and valley and sea. 

11. When California Began 23 

Legends and traditions that preceded 
the discovery of the Golden Land, 
tales of wanderers, Cabrillo's appear- 
ance at San Diego. 

III. The Story of the Missions .... 55 

How the great Franciscan, Junipero 
Serra, came to California in 1769; an 
account of the labors performed by 
him and his successors. 

IV. Monterey, the First Capital .... 99 

The lost place that was found and 
where the star of a new empire was 
swung from cypress shores. 

V. The Spanish Era 117 

A narrative of the days when the 
King's men lived and had their being 
under California's skies. 

VI. The Mexican Era 151 

Stories of the romantic times when 
the great ranchos between the Har- 
bor of the Sun and the Valley of the 
Seven Moons were scenes of love 
and hate. 



CONTEXTS-CoMfimit'ii 



CHAPTEK 

VII. The Be.\r Fl.\g Republic 



The wonderful band of Americans 
who established a free and independ- 
ent republic prior to the supremacy of 
the Stars and Stripes. 



VIII. The Argonauts 



The thrill of the "Days of Forty- 
nine." when the gold fields of Cali- 
fornia became the mecca of the world 
and the goal of picturesque adven- 
turers. 



IX. The American Conquest 



Stirring times that led up to the ad- 
mission of California into the sister- 
hood of states of the American Union. 



X. The Fi\-e Miracles 



The marvelous achievements of prog- 
ress to which California lays claim 
from the date of first settlement to the 
da\\'n of the twentieth centurv. 



PAGE 
187 



209 



239 



275 



Appendix 

i. c0i"nties of c.\ufoknia 309 

II. Celebr^tet "Pious Fund' . . ... 323 

III. Frimoxts Famous Ride 343 

IV. JuKiPERo Serr-\'s Most Famous Walk .... 349 
V. The Great Seal of the State 355 

VI. El C-\miko Re.\l 361 

VII. The Gr.\ve of Juxipero Serra 363 

VIII. Muster Roll of "The Vigh-kxtes" 367 



ILLUSTRATIONS 

FACING 
PAGE 

Mission San Carlos De Carmel (Frontispiece) 

The Land of Heart's Desire 3 

Map of California 23 

Hanging the Mission Bell 55 

Monterey 99 

The Golden Gate nv 

Old California House I5i 

The Bear Flag Monument 187 

COLOMA 209 

Cahuenga Pass 239 

The Sierra Nevada 275 



CALIFORNIA 
ITS HISTORY AND ROMANCE 



'Twixt the seas and the deserts, 

'Twixt the wastes and the waves, 
Betzveen the sands of buried lands 

And ocean's coral caves, 
It lies not Bast nor West, 

But like a scroll unfurled. 
Where the hand of God hath hung it, 

Dozvn the middle of the world. 

It lies where God hath spread it, 

In the gladness of His eyes. 
Like a iiame of jeweled tapestry 

Beneath His shining skies; 
With the green of zvoven meadows, 

And the hills in golden chains. 
The light of leaping rivers. 

And the Hash of poppied plains. 

Days rise that gleam in glory. 

Days die with sunset's breeze. 
While from Cathay that was of old 

Sail countless argosies; 
Morns break again in splendor 

O'er the giant, nezv-born West, 
But of all the lands God fashioned, 

'Tis this land is the best. 

Sun and dews that kiss it, 

Balmy zvinds that blozv. 
The stars in clustered diadems 

Upon its peaks of snow; 
The mighty mountains o'er it, 

Belozv, the zvhite seas szvirled — 
Just California stretching down 

The middle of the world. 



CALIFORNIA 

ITS HISTORY AND ROMANCE 



THE LAND OF HEAKT^S DESIRE 

THE cosmographers have done their worst, at 
last — or their best. It is wholly a matter of 
which way you care to look at it. Nothing 
remains, any more, for the imagination. There is 
not a terra incognita left on the face of the earth. 

From Dan to Beersheba is now a mere day's 
Marathon for the members of an amateur athletic 
club. The whole ''cow country," even, has been 
fenced in. All that lingers is the long baffled heel 
which is to be placed on the South Pole ; and that is 
liable to happen any day. Then the last parallel and 
meridian wiU have been checked up, and Marco Polo 
may rest content in his forgotten grave. 

But the situation is not without compensation, 
though the ultimate Treasure Island has been plowed 
knee-deep and John Silver need never come back to 
muster another cut-throat crew. And the compensa- 
tion is this, that the poet's dreams — ages old — of a 
*'Land of Heart's Desire" have been realized in the 
actual discovery of that earthly Paradise. It is cer- 
tainly California. 

Happily, there is no country unbeloved. It may be 
that you will have seen a Patagonian pining among 
the green fields of a sunny land for the desolate plains 
where he was born. Or it may be that you have 
turned from the note of a flute in a music hall to see 



4 CALIFORNIA 

in the eyes of a stranger the hunger of a longing, not 
knowing that his heart was far fled to a forest where 
none but himself had been a boy. Native land with 
some people is a passion; with every man it is at 
least a memory tender with affection. 

Still, it is true that in all ages men have dreamed 
that there was somewhere on the yet ungirdled globe 
an ideal land, fairer and kindlier than their own. 
Long was that fair land sought. Phoenician, Greek 
and all went forth to seek it — deep-sea voyagers, far- 
inland wanderers, Jason in the Argo and Marcos de 
Niza with dusty staff upon Cibola's luring trails. 
Wave-tossed and footsore they fared upon the quest. 

But now there is no longer a dragon-guarded fron- 
tier that awaits a daring prow or an adventurous 
sandal. The knowledge of every land and every sea 
is complete and available. You can get it all for a 
penny at the map-seller's store, just around the 
corner. 

It seems that there has never been such a thing as 
a myth. Everything that man has dreamed of or 
that he saw in visions from the beginning had some 
foundation in fact. We speak now with our very 
voices across seas that were limitless to the ancients 
and that Columbus spent so many weary weeks to 
cross. Daedalus was not a myth, but simply a man 
in advance of his age, as was also "Darius Green in 
his flying machine. ' ' And so, with California known 
to all the world as it is known today, we see that the 
"Land of Heart's Desire" was equally as unmythi- 
cal as were the other strange visions which have 
dreamed their way across the mist-hung pathways 
of the centuries. 

The proof lies in the fact that those who come to 
California, like the messengers of Ulysses to the 
Lotus Land, lose the desire to return whence they 
came. It is so from the very first wanderer 



THE LAND OF HEART'S DESIRE 5 

who set foot upon the bright shores of the Sunset 
Sea, stretching in glory down the world from Shasta's 
snowy crown to San Diego's harbor of the sun. He 
found a new land fairer than his own on which to 
feast his senses, a new love in his heart stronger 
than the old. Since that far-away day when Juan 
Rodriguez Cabrillo sailed with his galleons from 
Navidad to lie down with death on a sunny isle of 
Santa Barbara, California has called with luring 
lips the wandering sails and caravans of all the world. 



Of old she called with her lips of song, 

She called with her breath of musk, 
From peaks where the sunlight lingers long, 

From the vales in the purpled dusk ; 
She called to the seas with their tides of tang, 

To the ships of the far-off fleet. 
And they came in the lure of the song she sang. 

With their white sails, to her feet. 



So, like a mother with bursting breast, 

She claimed the brood of the seas. 
And the flaming lips of her wild love pressed 

Upon them, about her knees ; 
She crooned them to sleep on her bosom fair, 

Where their happy hearts were lain. 
And they laughed in her eyes that wrapped them there. 

Like their old, warm skies of Spain. 



With cheeks of olive and eyes of night. 

They laughed in her glad caress. 
And she gave them her Land of the Living Light 

For their wandering feet to press ; 
She gave them her Land of the Sun and Shine, 

Where the seas and the deserts part, 
And they brought her their gifts of the fig and vine, 

And wound them around her heart. 



CALIFORNIA 

Yet, oft in the light of the mellow moons 

From the jaspered heavens hung, 
'Mid the tinkle of soft Castilian tunes 

And the bells from the Mission rung. 
She dreamed of her bounty brimming o'er, 

Of her largess of field and plain. 
And then from the sweep of the sunlit shore, 

Her fond lips called again. 

Again she called, and from far away, 

Over desert and mountain keep, 
In lands where the wind-swept prairies lay. 

And the ice-clasped torrents sleep. 
They heard her voice, like a golden chime. 

And in dreams they saw her rise 
From golden streams in a golden clime, 

'Neath the blue of faithful skies. 

Then, forth from the toil of grudging field 

And their grinding marts they fled. 
While the good ship Argo sailed, new-keeled, 

Where the long sea journey led; 
And anon through forests and wastes they fared, 

Over trackless plain and hill, 
And many a blood-stained trail they dared. 

To the voice that called them still. 

They came, and she dowered with spendthrift hands, 

The hopes of their wildest dreams. 
And she flung at their feet the golden sands 

That slept in her shining streams — 
Saxon and Teuton and Celt that trod 

The paths of her treasured springs. 
With shoon of silver their feet she shod, 

And clothed them in robes of kings. 

Thus hath she called with her lips of song, 

Of old, with her breath of musk. 
From hills where the sunlight lingers long. 

And the vales in the purpled dusk. 
And so, from her heart's unwearied love, 

Rings her voice with its olden thrill; 
From the seas below and the skies above. 

She is calling, calling still. 



THE LAND OF HEART'S DESIRE 7 

The charm of California is no fitful charm. She 
has never had a faithless lover. Whoever has fallen 
under the spell of her beauty seeks no other mis- 
tress. Son and daughter that she has borne worship 
her very name. The expatriate clings to her with 
a deep and undying affection that ends only with the 
shadow of death. At the touch of her hands the ills 
that terrorize childhood in the fickle outlands come 
not to estop the frolics of health; manhood rises to 
vast achievements and great deeds of progress; old 
age lengthens to unwonted years, blessed with serene 
content. 

There is no other land so lovely, so constant, so 
generous. It Lies between the desert and the sea — 
God's two sanatoriums for weary flesh and weary 
mind. The Sierra's eternal snows, the desert's clean, 
hot breath, the Ocean's cool winds and the warmth 
of the sinuous current of Japan winding through it, 
all combine to make a climate hopelessly unrivaled 
by even the most favored shores of the Mediterra- 
nean. It is a land of artists' dreams, endless with 
flower-flamed uplands, swinging lomas and majestic 
mountains. It changes with every color of the day 
and is soft and sweet unspeakably under low-hang- 
ing stars and great, shining moons. 

There is not anywhere a Valley to rival the beauty 
of Yosemite, or the fruitful area of the San Joaquin ; 
the most splendid harbor in the world is the Bay of 
San Francisco ; the Mariposa Sequoias are the larg- 
est trees in existence as they are also the oldest Living 
things on the face of the earth. Never was there a 
road more glamorous with romance or more eloquent 
with service than El Camino Real on which still 
linger the gray ruins of the old Franciscan Missions. 
Southward wind still the brown trails of the Padres, 
northward are the hills from which the Argonauts 



8 CALIFORNIA 

wrung the most stupendous cache of gold that Nature 
had ever hidden away. 

If you were to spend a year of happy wanderings 
between San Diego 's harbor of the sun and the Valley 
of the Seven Moons, and then another summer still 
till you reach the trails that Lie under Shasta across 
the hills of Del Norte, Modoc and Siskiyou, then 
would you know with what tenderness God has fash- 
ioned California. Always from the Wander Trail 
would your eyes behold the glory of the sea, the soft 
purple of dreamy isles, sun and shine to light your 
feet by day and the wonder of the stars to cover you 
at night. 

There is no brighter estuary on any shore than the 
Bay of San Diego, and it is there that California 
began. It is the place of first things. It is the first 
Port of Home on the shores of the Pacific on the 
western rim of the United States. Here were reared 
on those shores the first cross, the first church and 
the first town. It was here, too, that sprang from 
primeval wastes the first cultivated field, the first 
palm, and the first vine and olive tree to blossom into 
fruitage beneath a wooing sun from the life-giving 
waters of the first irrigation ditch. 

San Diego is very old in history, yet young in 
destiny. She looks back on a past that stretches 
nearly four hundred years into the now dim and 
misty pathways of civilization. She knew the white 
man's wandering ships before Columbus was much 
more than cold in his grave. Her tiled roof trees and 
Christian shrines received the salutes of the booming 
tides before the Declaration of Independence was 
signed and before Betsy Ross wove from summer 
rainbows and wintry stars the miracle of ''Old 
Glory." 

It would seem that San Diego has more than a 
share of good fortune in her Bay and the charm that 



THE LAND OF HEAET'S DESIRE 9 

environs it, yet she has in reserve a charm fully as 
great in the mountain valleys that lie within the 
clasp of the mighty hills above and all around her. 
Over vast sunlit passes and down through a thou- 
sand winding trails of glory these marvelous vales 
lie in wait for the traveler with an endless and 
kaleidoscopic delight. In changeful series, one after 
another, they lure and beckon the wayfarer eagerly 
and with a joy indescribable. 

In these wonderful valleys and uplifted hills still 
linger memories of the romantic past. Upon the 
way are the remains of olden shrines; an ancient 
mission bell suspended from scarred and weather 
beaten timbers, all that remain of a chapel; fields 
where battles were fought, and the pathetic wrecks 
of villages where, solemn and pleading, linger the 
remnants of a race starved and wronged and out- 
raged through years of cruel neglect. You shall see 
many a dark face still in the wild outposts of Campo 
and in places near — they who once were the sole 
possessors of all this beauty. No more is theirs the 
land that rose like a dream of Paradise before the 
enraptured eyes of Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo and his 
daring crew in the long dead centuries of the past; 
no more is the kindly care of the Padres thrown 
around them. Against the greatness of today they 
stand as the sole pitiful, hopeless protest — the one 
sad blot on an enthralling picture. 

Through these valleys, beginning with the one 
called El Cajon, the trail leads wild and high, bidding 
the wanderer ever to turn that he may still see the 
bright, distant Bay, the towers of Coronado and the 
purple islands far out upon the bosom of a turquoise 
sea. The road goes ever upward until it reaches 
Descanso, which is called ''the place of rest," then 
down into the valley which lies over San Felipe, and 
downward yet again into Santa Ysabel and Santa 



10 CALIFORNIA 

Maria. From thence the road leaps across shining 
summits into the hot springs of Warners and on and 
on until the "King's Highway" stretches before you 
to ruined Pala and the splendor of San Luis Rey. 

You shall swing now inward from sight of the sea 
to the bright Lake of Elsinore. Happily it may be 
near evening time, and you shall behold the linger- 
ing kiss of the sun on the Mountains of Mystery — 
the peaks of San Gorgonio, San Bernardino, San 
Antonio, and, beyond them aU, the white majesty of 
San Jacinto, the kingly outpost of the royal hills. 

There are mountains everywhere in California — 
barriers alike against the great ocean and the great 
desert — gleaming hills of glory upstanding against 
the bluest of skies or rifting the sometime cloud. Be- 
tween Shasta in the north and Whitney in the south 
they stretch their golden chains — and farther still. 
So vast and mighty are they that half a world might 
find room and sustenance within their canyons and 
innumerable recesses — each man with his vine and 
fig tree, his nine bean rows and a hive for the honey 
bee. 

It were difficult to say which section of these moun- 
tains is the most alluring, but where now you stand 
under the glow of the San Bernardinos you shaU 
behold the Mountain of the Arrowhead, which is 
certainly the most mysterious mountain in the world. 
From the fioor of the valley below it rises to a height 
of two thousand feet and is visible with perfect dis- 
tinctness from a distance of thirty miles. 

Nowhere else on the globe has nature produced a 
phenomenon so startling. There are mountains else- 
where marked with what purport to be symbols, 
but they all demand a more or less generous stretch 
of the imagination. It is not so, however, in the case 
of the Arrowhead. The representation is absolutely 
faithful, even to the slightest details. It is as though 



THE LAND OF HEART'S DESIRE 11 

a giant Indian god had torn an arrowhead from a 
shaft in his quiver and had hurled it flat into the 
great green hill — how long ago no man knows or ever 
can know. 

With its point downward, the gigantic Arrowhead 
is a quarter of a mile in length and five hundred 
fifty feet in width, covering an area of seven and 
one-half acres. It is caused by a growth of light 
green vegetation known as "white sage," springing 
from a gray soil of decomposed granite. This growth 
and soil are confined to the Arrowhead's absolutely 
perfect outlines. There is not a flaw in the drawing 
from shank to barb. Closing in on these outlines is 
a dark soil on which is a growth of thick chap- 
arral composed mostly of chamiso and greasewood. 
Thus is the Arrowhead caused. But who or what 
caused the cause ? It is unworthy of any thoughtful 
person, scientist or layman, to dismiss so strange a 
subject with the weak assertion that the thing is 
''merely a freak." Freaks are freaks; the Arrow- 
head is a perfection. 

The Argonauts of '49 tell us that the Arrowhead 
was there when they first saw California ; the Mormon 
pioneers of the San Bernardino Valley say it ante- 
dates their coming; the Franciscan Padres saw it a 
hundred years ago, just as we see it now, and the 
Indians told the first white man that their fathers 
and their fathers' fathers had climbed to its great 
shadows to drink and bathe in the healing waters 
that still leap scalding hot and freezing cold from 
its point. 

Strangely enough, the only explanation of the 
mystery is that offered by the Indians, who, in their 
legends, assert that the mark was made by a fiery 
arrowhead hurled from the sky in a battle between 
two gods. The mark may have been made by a 
lightning bolt, by some god who desired to use it 



12 CALIFORNIA 

to direct the afflicted to the healing waters. It may 
be so. Who is so wise as to say no ? 

Was the Arrowhead there when the mountain first 
rose from the flood, or was it wrought afterward by 
some wonderful race of men in a dim age of the past ? 
If it be man-made, by what skill was it accomplished 
to withstand the ravages of fire and water, earth- 
quake and the inexorable destroyer. Time itself, cen- 
tury after century, down to this very hour? And 
how much longer will it last f Is it destined to await 
the final crash of the universe or will it fade from 
sight tomorrow, disappearing as mysteriously as it 
came? 

It serves only to deepen the mystery of this strange 
and wonderfully beautiful mountain to contemplate 
the fact that the arrowhead is the most universal of 
symbols. All arrowheads, whether found in Califor- 
nia, Ohio, Asia, Africa, Peru or anywhere else on 
earth, are fashioned from the same pattern. Where- 
ever savage man, prehistoric or otherwise, made an 
arrowhead, he made it exactly on the design with 
which we are all familiar. In illustration, if a tribe 
of savages were brought from the African jungle to 
America, everything would be entirely strange to 
them. They would see nothing familiar, nothing 
that they could recognize. But if they were brought 
to San Bernardino Valley they would instantly rec- 
ognize the symbol on the Mountain of the Arrowhead. 
Therefore, if it were the intent of the inscrutable 
power that branded the mountain to draw the atten- 
tion of all men to it, no symbol at all approaching 
the effectiveness of the arrowhead could have been 
used. 

Leaving reluctantly, indeed, the fascination of the 
Mountain of the Arrowhead, the wanderer comes soon 
on the trails he has set out to travel to the spot where, 
enfolded in a curve of the King's Highway, bright 



THE LAND OF HEART'S DESIRE 13 

with beauty and glamorous with the romance of Cali- 
fornia of the South, lies mountain-belted Riverside. 
It is clasped in an evergreen valley, walled by the 
snow-capped peaks of the Sierra Madre and the 
swinging lomas of the Temescals. Above the town 
towers the mount of Rubidoux, brown-robed like a 
Franciscan and tipped by a great cross erected by 
reverent and loving hands in memory of Fra Juni- 
pero Serra, founder of the California Missions. To 
reach this cross there is a winding road, sinuous as 
a serpent's trail and broad and smooth as the Appian 
Way. Beneath the cross is a tablet of bronze un- 
veiled on the twelfth day of October, year of Christ, 
1909, by William Howard Taft, twenty-seventh 
President of the United States, and at another point 
on the road is still another tablet bearing this greet- 
ing from John Muir : 

"Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. 
Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows 
into the trees. The winds will blow their own fresh- 
ness into you, and the storms their energy; while 
cares will drop off like Autumn leaves." 

It is even so. From the top of Rubidoux great 
are the good tidings. You shall look up and see, 
stiU higher, the peaks of the Mother Mountains 
crowned with November snows that wait for August 
with her drowsy noons. Around and all below you 
stretch the green groves of Hesperides, heavy with 
golden apples or decked with perfumed blossoms, the 
thread of a silvery river wound between; the flame 
of flowered hedges leaping across rolling hillocks like 
the swell of the sea and the lash of its breakers at 
sunset; red-roofed cottages and the wide porticos of 
stately mansions against which the roses clamber; 
never Winter and never death, but Summer always 
and undying bloom. 

There was a time when the spot where glow these 



14 CALIFORNIA 

Daphnean groves lay fathoms deep beneath salt water 
and the Valley of the Santa Ana was an estuary of 
the great ocean that can still be seen from the top of 
Rubidoux. Doubtless the ancient cave-men and cliff- 
dwellers of Mount San Jacinto, twenty miles away, 
knew Rubidoux only as an island where the gray 
gulls made their nests. It may be that once a ven- 
turesome voyager built a camp-fire there and boasted 
afterward of his grand emprise in the San Jacinto 
caves, upon his return. But, be that as it may, the 
happy thing is that when the sea shrank and receded 
from amid these mountain walls it did not carry 
Rubidoux with it. Man has builded pyramids, but 
he could not build a mountain. 

From Rubidoux the journey lies through citrus 
groves and bright cities into the Valley of Our Lady, 
which is set between the great dyke of the Tehachapi 
and San Diego's harbor of the sun, about midway. 
You wiU come to the ancient mission hospice of San 
Gabriel and the still waiting welcome that was there 
of old for Juan de Anza, the captain of Tubac, and 
for every wayfarer that followed after him on the 
trail he blazed from Sonora to Monterey. You will 
look upon Mission walls gray with the century and 
a quarter of age, still strong to endure — the campa- 
nile song-haunted with thrush and linnet, the bells 
eloquent with the voices and memories of the past. 

The Mother Mountains hem the VaUey in as 
though with the shining scimitar of a giant god. Its 
open boundaries are the Sunset Sea's white shores 
of glory. Its capital is the world-famed city of Los 
Angeles, metropolis of the wide-flung, magical South- 
west, reborn to verdant pastures and orchard blooms 
from desert dust and immemorial wastes. 

It is a place of miracles from first to last — miracles 
of faith that were of old and miracles of progress 
that are of today. From Pasadena at the foot of the 



THE LAND OF HEART'S DESIRE 15 

Sierra Madre to Santa Monica on the ocean strand, 
the Valley of Our Lady is grown into one vast city. 
A half million people dwell within it, and ever the 
mighty throng increases. The feet of coimtless thou- 
sands of tourists and strangers tread its sunlit high- 
ways every year. Day by day its vineyards and 
olive groves are invaded by crowding homes and 
towering, steel-ribbed marts of trade until there shall 
be at last no place for the honey bee to keep his hive. 
The fields that fed a thousand flocks and yet a thou- 
sand herds are fighting their hopeless battles against 
the aggressions of brick and mortar and stone. Few 
men once knew the place ; and once there was a time 
when one man owned it all. Now it has been slashed 
and calipered into squares and triangles, some of 
which — not larger than a tennis court — cannot be 
purchased with less than a king's ransom. 

From any hill in the Valley of Our Lady, or from 
the housetops of Los Angeles, you shaU see Santa 
Catalina lying upon the bosom of the Pacific — the 
magic isle in a summer sea. From July to November 
Santa Catalina is a glamor of brown hills — a group 
of segregated Franciscans in their own sea monas- 
tery, as though for special meditation apart from 
the populous brown-robed hills across the dancing 
waters on the shores of the continent. Yet it is then 
that the isle is vibrant and joyously boisterous with 
the hallos and laughter of many children. Whole 
families transport themselves across the channel 
from all over California and the sim-blazed South- 
west during vacation season. In tents and quaint 
cottages that look like dolls ' houses, the world of the 
Pacific slope is at play on Santa Catalina. 

But in winter, when the rains have fallen, the 
magic isle doffs its Franciscan gown and dons robes 
of emerald, jewelled and spangled with red and yel- 
low holly, pink and white cherry blossoms, acacias, 



16 CALIFORNIA 

purple lilac and a thousand wild flowers of every 
sheen. 

And like unto this isle are the isles of Santa Bar- 
bara, each one with a charm and beauty of its own, 
Santa Rosa being particularly beautiful with its 
sunny central valley and its great shore caves in 
which are the sea's centuries of thunders and its 
voices of mystery. 

Of Santa Barbara itself, one need not hesitate to 
say that there is no other spot on the globe that, for 
the purposes of comparison, can be likened to it. It 
is different from all the spots found on the West 
Coast of the Americas. Sometimes a traveler will 
say that he is reminded of Capri when he comes to 
Santa Barbara. Be this as it may, it is a place unto 
itself, exceeding the Riviera in beauty and in climate. 

Sometimes, again, there are those who speak of a 
''Valley of Santa Barbara," but it is not a valley. 
Instead, it is a mountain slope creeping down to the 
sea across the rise and fall of gentle lomas. To the 
north. Point Concepcion shoulders itself out into the 
vast waters as the shining, magnificent mountain wall 
of the Santa Ynez range sweeps in a great, glowing, 
crescent above the sunset ocean. There, sheltered in 
warm embrace with a southern exposure, sits Santa 
Barbara, not more than 100,000 acres comprising her 
entire domain, but every rood of ground as fertile as 
the silts of the Nile. 

Nor is this all that makes the charm, the beauty, 
the climatic peace and calm and the fascination of 
Santa Barbara. Twenty-five miles out to sea a 
marine mountain range, twin sister of the Santa 
Ynez on shore, rears its glowing peaks from the 
tumbling billows in a series of islands. So it is that 
Santa Barbara faces not the open sea, but a channel 
or a strait of the sea. Up into this channel flows 
the warm ocean current from the south and so adds 



THE LAND OF HEART'S DESIRE 17 

its beneficence to complete the climatic combination 
that keeps the spot snug and warm and free from all 
violence in winter, the selfsame combination leaving 
it cool and refreshing through the long, sunny sum- 
mers. So, also, do the twin moimtain ranges — the 
one on land, the other out at sea — give Santa Bar- 
bara a marine playground as safe and as placid as 
the lake of Tahoe. The channel is a yachtman's 
paradise. To its long sweep of blue waters — a 
stretch of seventy nules — come the Pacific-coast- 
built ships of the American navy to be tried out and 
tested for speed and endurance. 

From Santa Barbara the Wander Trail, ever 
glowing and ever luring, swings inland again upon 
the glorious vista of the Valley of Santa Clara. 
From any one of a hundred hills the lovely vale 
stretches beneath the eye in gardens of roses and 
miles of orchards, making endless pictures of delight 
that words are weak to describe. No soul could be 
so dull as to ever forget the matchless scene of valley 
and hill and winding stream that spreads itself for 
the beholder from the fascinating hill town of Los 
Gatos, clasped in a curve of the Santa Cruz moun- 
tains. It is one of the rarest scenic panoramas on 
the globe. First, there is the town itself, clean and 
quaint, nestled in the sunny embrace of the great, 
kind hills. Then, look what way you will, there are 
endless pictures — soft glens green with spreading 
oaks, towering groves of eucalyptus, green orchards 
jewelled with the sapphire of ripening plums, wind- 
ing, curving, sweeping uplands and the uplifted 
splendor of mountains in glowing majesty. 

Above Los Gatos tower the Santa Cruz mountains 
in the innumerable nooks of which are clinging vine- 
yards, gardens and homes that hide under magic 
trails, surprising the traveler into new delights at 
every one of a thousand turns. Quaint nooks are 



18 OAMFOKMA 

thoso tliat havo oac-h thoir own vistas of vallov aiui 
nioinitain c>r i^limpsos of tho briu'lit waters of the Ray 
o( San KraTU'isi'o loacuos away in tho distance. And, 
if yon will olinib tiio brown poaks of the highest 
tnoinitain, yon may see the Stniset C^eean breaking 
aiiainst its wlnte shores. 



Ono tiTuo m Sprinsrtiino Oo<i miuio n porfoot day. 

Ho woko Tuo ill tho inonuni; luid hid u\y oaros away. 

He woko mo with a thrush's sonv: and with tho Hnnot's trills. 

And took mo in His hands and sot mo on tho hills. 

Ho sot mo on tho hills, on tho topmost hill of all. 
And I hoard tho mornini; winds and far soa-broakors oall; 
1 hoarvl tho winds a-singini; fron\ land and wator mot. 
Anvi 1 li\ a thousand voars. oh. 1 novor oat\ fori^ot ! 



Onee eaeh year m the clorv of the Oaliforuian 
spriniitinie. while yet the world beyond the rims of 
the Sierras is eold in the death of winter, the people 
oIl Santa cMara Walley eelebrate the Feast o( the 
Blossoms. The wonder is that half the world is not 
there when the wondrous vale is one e,*reat white sea 
of living bloont. Neither eherry blossom time in 
dapan nor blossom time anywhere ean eon\pare witJi 
the intoxieation of beauty in the Plai-e of the Two 
Shrines when the prune orchards are arrayed in tlie 
spleitdor o\' the Spring. 

Ho touohod my oyos with jjladnoss. with baluv of niorniui: dows. 
On tho topn\ost ritn Ho sot mo. 'n\onsj tho Hills of Sat\ta Cruz. 
And 1 saw tho simlit oooan swoop. 1 saw tho valo bolow — 
Tho Valo of Santa Clara in a soa of blossomod snow. 

It was Sprinjjtimo and joy-timo. and God had lillod His loc^i 
With ^YOvon plains of poppios and orchards all a-bloom. 
With wob of gold and purplo in tho tlolds and uplands sjroon. 
And tlio whito woof of blossoms that strotohod awav botwoou. 



THE LAND OF HEART '8 DESIRE 19 

In the; V]!i<',v, of iho. Two ShririfiH lin^ca* ihc rornanr^e 
and ^lory of the golden a^o of CJalifornia. There is 
alHo found a beauty than which no beauty can be 
greater. TF)e HW(;ep of th(! majestic hills is there, 
and th(! wondrous fascination of the; opuhtnl valh^y. 
It is always b(;autiful, ravished with roses in .Janu- 
ary as well as in Junf;, and cindlciss with color at all 
times. I>ut it is in the ma^ic Springtime, when from 
mountain wall to mountain wall, from the green 
lomas of Ijos Oatos to the; watc^rs of the Bay, the sea 
of the; blossoms ebbs and flows in tides of p(;rfume, 
that Santa CMara is by far the most entrancingly beau- 
tiful spot in the whole wide; world. 

The trail that I'ortola ;i,nd his men made from San 
Diego in ITfif) uf)on the; (ju(!st for Mont(;rey leads 
through the Valley of Santa Clara and on to San 
Francisco. Tt is a trail now beaten with the feet of 
countless wanderers, and you will do w(!ll to follow 
where so many have gone bcd'ore. Throughout all 
the T^and of TTciart's Desire there; are innumc^rable 
plac(is of majestic beauty — the snow-crowned i)eaks 
of the vast Sierra, the stretches of endless, white 
surf-beaten sliorcis and great, bold hcv'ullands chal- 
lenging the; sea. And there are nooks in the hills 
and among cresccmt waters where the red and green 
roofs of the villages are a kindness to the eye. 

But the country lying around and all about the 
Golden rjate, to whicli now you have; come, is the 
place where nature revels in moods of spkmdor, de- 
lighting in vastness that she softens with the magic 
touches of an affection ever changeful yet never in- 
constant. 

From the top of Tamal7)ais, which rises like a green 
monolith above the blue ocean, there stretch beneath 
the eye on every side the kaleidoscoyx'S of hill and 
valley, plain and river, the two hundred and fifty 



20 CALIFORNIA 

square miles of the great harbor and the ILmitless 
sweep of the stupendous Pacific, the Mother of the 
Seas. 

Sometimes the vision beholds a sea of fog, roll- 
ing in milky waves and wrapping the world below 
in deep-hung veils of mystery. Again the veil 
is lifted and yonder crowd the masts of the ships 
from near and distant ports, flytag the pennants of 
all nations. The Sacramento and the San Joaquin, 
like threads of silver, wind down from their native 
hills, through lush and opulent valleys, to mingle 
their waters with the salty tides. Bronzed and 
crypted with iron-throated guns, sleep the pillars of 
the Golden Gate in the setting sun. The voices of 
laughing children and the clang of bells rise from the 
villages nestled at the moimtains' feet. Dim in a 
purple haze lie the FaraUones off to sea. Oakland 
with her busy life, the green meadows of Alameda, 
the clustering towns of Marin and the sweep of 
Contra Costa's hills, all send their sunset greetings 
to the uplifted heights, to the parting ships that put 
out upon wandering voyages. Then night and its 
myriad stars in the vaulted blue of the wide, deep 
overhanging heavens, and the countless lights of the 
city of St. Francis and her sisters of the waters 
twinkle in the vibrant dusk. 

Ofttimes, mayhap, there be those that wander there 
whom the eyes of mortals cannot see — St. Francis 
with sandaled feet and Brother Juniper, his beloved 
disciple, searching for hungry mouths and ragged 
beggars and tossed, sore-beaten souls; Portola in 
plumed hat and slashed breeches haunting the brown 
hill which made him immortal; Father Serra bark- 
ening to the Mission bells when the Angelus is ring- 
ing ; the souls of Argonauts seeking again the golden 
fleece ; deep-sea sailors, tattooed and swart, with rings 
in their ears ; and, in the soft, deep glory of the sum- 



THE LAND OF HEART'S DESIRE 21 

mer night, Juan de Ayala, on the deck of the San 
Carlos, the first to sail through the Golden Gate. 

Nor is it here the bright trails end. Still on they 
lead in sun and shine far beyond the last estuary of 
the great Bay, past San Rafael and Sonoma in the 
Valley of the Seven Moons where the Franciscans 
reared the last outpost of the Missions. And farther 
still they lead amid vast forests, tumbling rivers and 
gleaming lakes to Shasta's snowy glory, and yet on- 
ward for many another league. And then you shall 
double on your tracks, backward across the ranges of 
Siskiyou and Modoc, through orchard land and 
meadow, in and out of the haunts of the Argonauts, 
greeting anon the ancient Sequoias as your elder 
brothers whom time has towered to the skies. The 
Yosemite shall beckon to you from the vast stretches 
of the San Joaquin, into which the German Father- 
land might be thrown and have room to spare. 

So shall you wander, with sunny heart, upon the 
golden trails of the Land of Heart's Desire. A thou- 
sand miles the trail shall lead you, and thrice a thou- 
sand wonders shall you see — white peaks of glory 
and sunset shores of dream, yucca and poppy on the 
upland slopes, gardens deep with roses in each val- 
ley's heart, brown roadsides hushed with ruined 
fanes ; and, here and there, a moldered cross upon a 
haunted hill. 






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MAP OF CALIFORNIA 
(Early Voyages and Old Missions) 



II 

"WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 

VERY early in the sixteenth century there was 
published in Spain a book of romance called 
'*Las Sergas de Esplandian." In this book 
the author told of ''the great Island of California, 
where a great abundance of gold and precious stone 
is found." As far as can be known it was in this 
book that the name "California" was first coined. 
And from that hour the quest of the same island 
began — the goal of deep-sea wanderers and soldiers 
of fortune, conquistadores, proselytizers and the 
dreamers of dreams. 

The mistaken idea that California was an island 
lasted long after her golden shores of glory had been 
seen and to some extent explored. Legend also peo- 
pled it with a race of Amazons who wore bracelets 
and other ornaments of gold. It was pictured as a 
land of untold riches, which, of course, it was and is, 
but the discovery of gold remained for the Americans 
who did not come in the footsteps of the Spaniards 
until more than three hundred years had passed. 

To begin at the beginning of California, or rather 
to go back to events which led up to its beginning, 
it is necessary that the mind revert to the year 1521 
when Cortes had reduced by conquest the New Spain 
of those times, which is the Mexico and the South 
America of today. Cortes had reduced the country 
to a state of servility and the Aztecs who still re- 
mained alive had been tamed to eat out of the Con- 
queror's hand, although a time had now come when 



24 CALIFORNIA 

Cortes had somewhat lost his influence with the throne 
in far-away Spain. He had also lost a good deal of 
the gold and treasure he had wrung from poor old 
Monteziuna and his people, and was eager to find 
another virgin field for his masterly exploitation in 
order that he might make another haul and reinstate 
himself with the King by adding new and perhaps 
greater provinces to Castile and Leon. 

Well, there were great tales going the rounds in 
Mexico those days of a coimtry to the north which 
outshone both Mexico and Peru in wealth as the sun 
outshines the moon. And the favorite tale was of the 
Seven Cities of Cibola — seven magical cities where 
the people made use of gold with the same abandon 
that people living on a lake use water. Their great 
flat-roofed houses were said to be fairly wainscoted 
with gold; gold nuggets were lying around in the 
streets to throw at the cats. The Seven Cities were 
the talk of all Mexico, and everybody believed in their 
existence, including Cortes, who sent out three dif- 
ferent expeditions, from time to time, in vain searches 
to find them. 

It was in the height of this excitement that Alvaro 
Nunez Cabesa de Vaca appeared in the City of Mex- 
ico one fine summer's day in the year 1537, footsore 
and weary, but able to eat a man's-sized meal and to 
swallow a few flagons of pulque to wash the cob- 
webs and the dust of travel from his throat. With 
him were three companions, Alonzo del Castillo, 
Andres de Orantes and a negro named Estevanico. 
It does not appear from the ancient chronicles that 
the three companions had much, if anything, to say, 
but it does appear that Cabesa de Vaca was full of 
speech and nowise loth to let it out. 

The tale which de Vaca brought to Mexico was 
well calculated to stir the blood of men whose sole 
object in life was the amassment of wealth. He said 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 25 

he had come from Florida, a distance of consider- 
ably more than 3000 miles, and that it had taken 
himself and his companions a period of nine years 
to make the journey. He explained his presence in 
Florida by the statement that he had been a member 
of an ill-fated expedition from Spain to those shores 
and that all his companions except the three who 
were now with him had perished at the hands of the 
natives. He and the three who were saved with 
him managed to escape only because he had per- 
suaded the Indians that he was possessed of miracu- 
lous powers. 

So greatly had this man caused himself to be rev- 
erenced that the Indians handed him along from tribe 
to tribe without even so much as examining his hair 
to see how he would look without it. In those won- 
derful years of his wandering he had seen many 
great nations and grand cities ; he had seen so many 
bags of silver in different places that he couldn't 
begin to coimt them. The natives of the countries 
through which he passed even used emeralds for ar 
rowheads. But what he had seen, he said, appeared 
to be trifling compared to what he had heard of as 
existing in other countries and other cities farther 
north, in which gold and silver and precious gems 
were as common as thistles in Scotland. 

Mexico was stirred to its deepest depths by the 
narrative, and nobody even so much as took the 
trouble to cross-examine de Vaca. He was not asked 
to explain how he managed to wade the swamps and 
morasses and wend his way through the forests and 
tramp the great wastes that lie through Louisiana, 
Alabama and Texas; or how he got across the Mis- 
sissippi River and tramped the vast waterless plains 
and on down another seven hundred miles to the 
City of Mexico. It must be remembered, anyway, 
that in the year 1537 the geography of America was 



26 CALIFORNIA 

not clear in anybody's mind. One would suppose, 
however, that some doubting Thomas would have 
asked to be shown an emerald arrowhead, at least, 
being that they were so plentiful; but, no. Alvaro 
Nunez Cabesa de Vaca was a gentleman and there- 
fore his word was not to be questioned by a people 
so imbued with chivalry as were the Spaniards. 
But we of this day may be excused if we sometimes 
wonder what became of that tremendous supply of 
emeralds and in what particular portion of the 
southern part of the present United States they were 
indigenous to the soil, so to speak. 

It must have been a delight to de Vaca's heart to 
note the reawakening of energies which his tale 
called forth. The message of the really great liar 
is always one of awakenment. His purpose is to set 
things going, to stir sluggish blood and to supply 
courage to timid spirits. AU this de Vaca did and 
more. Cortes and other men in Mexico immediately 
jumped out of the dumps and started in to build 
ships and to outfit expeditions. The Seven Cities 
of Cibola, golden and studded with gems, again 
miraged the horizon. 

Comes now Marcos de Niza, a friar, consumed with 
a burning desire to convert the heathen of the Seven 
Cities to the faith. At any rate, and be this as it 
may, it is certain that Fray Marcos was the first man 
to get into action for the purpose of taking some 
advantage of the magnificent opportunities which 
Cabesa de Vaca had recounted. Calling the negro 
Estevanico aside in the cool of the cloister one fateful 
day, he interrogated him as to the truth of the tale. 
Estevanico was shocked that anybody should doubt 
what his master had told, but Fray Marcos smoothed 
that over somehow or other and asked the negro to 
go with him on an expedition to the Seven Cities. 

So, two years almost to the day after Cabesa de 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 27 

Vaca had appeared with his thrilling story, Marcos 
de Niza was on his way north with an expedition 
headed for Cibola and its Seven Cities, with Este- 
vanico as guide and several Indian porters to carry 
the baggage and supplies. 

It was many moons before Fray Marcos returned, 
but when he did he brought with him exact informa- 
tion of his journey, together with the sad intelligence 
that his entire entourage had been left dead behind 
him, including Estevanico. Of all that brave com- 
pany whose eyes had beheld so many wonders the 
friar himself was the only one destined to return. 
But what are a few men, more or less, in a world that 
was then, as now, perhaps overburdened with men? 
And, anyway, since Marcos was a holy man, it was 
not necessary that he should furnish corroboration 
of his story. Everybody believed him without the 
slightest hesitation. 

The account of his travels on this memorable jour- 
ney given by Marcos de Niza was substantially as 
follows : 

Upon setting out from Mexico he traveled a dis- 
tance of one hundred leagues and struck a desert 
which required four days to cross. He then met a 
number of natives who had never before seen a white 
man and who believed the friar to have come from 
another world. They offered him all kinds of pro- 
visions and presents and there wasn't anything that 
they were not willing to do for him. He had but 
to say the word. In answer to his inquiries they told 
him that there was a valley four days' journey to 
the east the inhabitants of which wore ornaments of 
gold on their arms and legs and in their ears and 
nostrils. Their pots and pans and kettles and things 
were also made of gold and the precious yellow metal 
was as common among them as adobe. 

But Fray Marcos did not take the trouble to visit 



28 CALIFORNIA 

this vaUey. What he was after was the Seven Cities, 
and he was on his way. He had no time to bother 
about a mere vaUey, no matter what amoimt of gold 
it might contain. Besides, Estevanico, the negro 
guide, was opposed to side trips. He said a vaUey 
of gold was a mere bagatelle to what was ahead of 
them. 

The expedition pushed on until it is likely that it 
was up beyond the present location of Fort Apache 
in Arizona. Many weeks had now passed, and the 
Easter season being at hand, Fray Marcos decided 
that he would rest and pray awhile, sending his fol- 
lowers out in three different directions to explore the 
country, Estevanico taking command of the principal 
party which went to the north, the other two taking 
to the east and west respectively. 

Later on two of the parties returned with nothing 
special to report, and things looked a little blue until 
one morning Estevanico was heard from. His report 
proved that there is all the difference in the world 
in sending out a man of imagination to do something 
and sending those who have to take a thing in their 
hands and feel of it before they can make up their 
minds what it is like. Estevanico had found the 
Seven Cities of Cibola and, though he did not return, 
himself, he sent a messenger with the good news. 

Fray Marcos de Niza now relates that he immedi- 
ately set forth in company with the messenger, leav- 
ing the rest of the party, alas! to die during his 
absence. 

As he advanced he received many confirmatory 
evidences of the greatness of the land which he was 
approaching, both from the people on the way and 
from the things he saw. He passed through a dis- 
trict where unicorns were as thick as the buffalo once 
were in Montana. These unicorns were twice the 
size of ordinary oxen and each beast had a horn of 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 29 

great length and strength growing out of the middle 
of its forehead. He also was told of another king- 
dom farther north that was even richer than Cibola. 

As the friar proceeded he was constantly joined 
by bands of friendly Indians who told him tales that 
made his eyes stick out, and he felt that he couldn't 
get into the Cibola country any too soon. He kept 
pushing along as fast as his legs could carry him and 
at last he was told that just on the other side of a hill 
to which he came the Seven Cities awaited him. At 
that moment a messenger came breathlessly to meet 
him with the terrifying news that the King of Cibola 
had put Estevanico and aU his companions to a cruel 
and bloody death and that this fierce monarch was, 
even then, waiting with the same war-club for Fray 
Marcos in order that he might kill him also. It was 
very discouraging, as any one might suppose, and the 
heart of the good friar faltered. 

Although Marcos was a brave man, he felt that he 
owed a duty to his country. If he were to die, who 
would take back to Mexico the news of the discovery 
of Cibola, the long-dreamed-of land of the Seven 
Cities? Ah, no! he must think of Spain. So he 
turned his face once more toward the south. But he 
could not resist the temptation to get at least a 
glimpse of Cibola. He stole stealthily upward until 
he had reached the summit of the hill overlooking the 
valley, and there before his entranced vision shone 
the Seven Cities in all their glory, encrusted in gold 
and shining with jewels. It was enough. Backward 
he traced his steps across the deserts to Mexico, ar- 
riving there safely and in due time with his tale of 
wonder. 

What happened after that was a-plenty. Ships 
started immediately up the West Coast to land expe- 
ditions that would cut across the country and strike 
into the heart of Cibola from the sea. A land expe- 



30 CALIFORNIA 

dition under command of the famous Francisco Vas- 
quez de Coronado, after whom Coronado Beach in 
California and the islands off the San Diego coast 
are named, also started out. Coronado got as far as 
the middle of Kansas, but was obliged to return dis- 
appointed in his quest. The sea expedition also came 
back unrewarded. The Seven Cities were never seen 
again, save as the present well-known Indian pueblos 
of New Mexico. 

Next comes Juan de Fuca, a Greek, and famous in 
his time as a pilot. And it was in his time that there 
was all kinds of talk in Mexico and all over the then 
known world of what were called ''The Straits of 
Anian," which constituted a waterway somewhere 
up in Oregon from the Pacific to the Atlantic. Prob- 
ably they had been better caUed the Straits of An- 
anias, because there never were any such straits. 
But navigators thought there surely must be a north- 
ern way to get back to Europe by boat without having 
to double Cape Horn. 

The hope of this short-cut by water back to Europe 
was not forsaken, and it was in the year 1592 that 
Juan de Fuca came to the fore with a proposition to 
go find this passage. His reputation as a sailor was 
so great that the Viceroy of Mexico fitted him out 
with two ships, well manned and provisioned. 

Juan de Fuca sailed away blithely and in due time 
returned with banners flying and an air of triumph 
about all his movements. He told the Viceroy he 
had found the Straits, all right, and had sailed 
through them from the Pacific clear out into the 
Atlantic and back again. He described the country 
along the Straits on both sides with patient minute- 
ness of detail, drew pictures of the islands he passed 
and, of course, said that the people living along the 
route were as rich as Midas. 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 31 

Juan de Fuca was never able to collect the biU 
with which he presented the Viceroy for his services. 
He later returned to his native land of Greece broken- 
hearted by the shabby treatment he had received at 
the hands of a rich but ungrateful nation. All that 
was ever done for him, as far as can be learned, was 
to name the entrance to Puget Sound in his honor, 
which was small reward for a man who had set things 
going as he had done. 
-^ It was fifty years prior to Juan de Fuca's voyage 
of fable, however, that our California of today was 
/discovered. In the year 1542, Juan Rodriguez Ca- 
I brillo, a Portuguese navigator of great repute, sailed 
1 from Navidad in the service of Cortes under the flag 
i of Spain, and arrived in the Bay of San Diego. This 
' is the first record that we have of the presence of 
white men in that harbor, and history acknowledges 
that the discovery of California belongs to this man, 
Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo. From out the mass of 
fiction, romance, legend and fairy tale that clings 
around California, the certain and authenticated 
voyage of Cabrillo stands as the one unimpeached 
fact upon which we can rely. 

Cabrillo never returned from the new bright Em- 
pire of the Sun which he had discovered from the 
prows of his daring ships. He died in California; 
his ships returned under another commander. Nei- 
ther did the voyage bring back to Cortes, who had 
sent it out, any profit or benefit; but the adventure 
has become immortal from the fact that it placed 
California on the map of the world. And it was 
from the records of the voyage which Cabrillo made 
and from the reckoning of the California coast line 
as far north as Cape Mendocino which he made that 
Sebastian Vizcaino, sixty years later, was able to 
sail over the same pathway to San Diego, the Isles 
of Santa Barbara, the dancing waters of Monterey 



32 CALIFORNIA 

and far northward beyond the portals of the Golden 
Gate. 

It is a strange thing that the great encyclopedias 
of modern times make no mention of Juan Rodriguez 
CabriUo, whose achievements as a discoverer are sec- 
ond only to the achievements of Colmnbus, and whose 
ability as a navigator was so marvelous. The books 
have taken great care to record the name of James 
W. Marshall, who discovered the first gold nugget 
in California, but the name of the man who discov- 
ered California itself is usually left out of works of 
reference, and the fame of one of the world's great- 
est sailors is in this way neglected. 

CabriUo 's voyage, which resulted in the discovery 
of California, thrills with the interest of adventure. 
To begin with, it is to be remembered that he suc- 
ceeded in penetrating portions of the Pacific which 
had turned back the repeated daring attempts of 
other capable mariners. The ships in which CabriUo 
sailed, the San Salvador and the Victoria, were small 
vessels that would now be considered unfit for service 
on our placid lakes. He met with many an adverse 
tide and was buffeted and beaten by furious storms, 
yet he sailed on and on with a dauntless heart untU 
he had mapped leagues upon leagues of shore that 
the eyes of no white man had ever seen before. 

Leaving the port of Navidad at the end of Jime, 
1542, CabriUo reached on August 20 a point on the 
west coast of Mexico caUed Cabo Bajo, which was 
the most northerly point ever reached by any of his 
predecessors. Putting in and out of every harbor 
he met upon the way and placing its location cor- 
rectly in his log, as well as giving these harbors and 
prominent headlands names, he at length passed the 
Coronado Islands and entered San Diego harbor, 
which he called San Miguel. The name San Diego 
was given to the place in subsequent years, and, al- 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 33 

though it is a goodly name, it seems that the saints 
themselves might have well agreed that this great 
harbor and the great city on its shores should bear 
the name of CabriUo of the ships who was the first 
of his race to drag an anchor there or to set foot upon 
its sun-swept hills. 

It seems that CabriUo 's expedition tarried a space 
of six days in San Diego and was loth to leave. A 
few days later he discovered the isles of San Clemente 
and Santa Catalina, planting the flag of Spain where- 
ever he went and claiming the country for the Spanish 
King. He visited the Harbor of San Pedro and sail- 
ing from thence he came upon the islands of Santa 
Cruz, Santa Eosa and San Miguel lying off the coast 
of Santa Barbara. Upon these islands and the points 
on the mainland at which he touched the Indians 
came to meet and to greet him, often bringing him 
fish and other things to eat. 

Again lifting sail, the little fleet put out to sea and 
sailed northward to what is now known as Point Con- 
cepcion, where it met with violent head-winds which 
drove it out to sea for several days. When the winds 
had somewhat abated CabriUo put back into the 
shelter of a smaU port where he remained for a time, 
and where an Indian queen and many of her people 
came to his ships as guests and made merry in feast 
and dance with the Spanish sailors. 

Although the weather continued very lowering with 
black skies, the expedition once more proceeded upon 
its voyage, rounding Point Pinos and entering the 
Bay of Monterey in the waters of which the ships 
anchored and the crews attempted to land. The vio- 
lence of the sea was such, however, and continued to 
be so, that CabriUo concluded to put back to the Santa 
Barbara coast and winter there. It is recorded that 
on the return voyage a severe accident from a falling 
mast befell the admiral, breaking his arm and other- 



34 CALIFORNIA 

wise so severely injuring him that, a few weeks after 
his arrival on the Island of San Miguel, he sickened 
and died, January 3, 1543. And there on that sunny 
island he still sleeps on, heedless of running tides and 
passing sail, the immortal Portuguese whose ships 
were first to sail on pathways of the seas to the Land 
of Heart's Desire. 

When Cabrillo knew that his time had come he 
placed his fleet in command of his chief pilot, Barto- 
lome Ferrelo, at the same time exacting from him a 
solemn pledge to continue the voyage of exploration 
as far northward as ships could sail — the thing he 
himself would have done had not death cut short his 
brave and splendid career. And when the great 
admiral had been laid in a sailor's grave on the sunny 
isle, they left him lonely there and the ships again 
4 sailed northward, reaching the point now Imown as 
I Cape Mendocino. Then a furious storm blew up, 
\ driving Ferrelo ahead at tremendous speed until, 
when tiie cahn fell and the thick fog had partly lifted, 
he found he was as far northward as Cape Blanco on 
the southern coast of what is now the State of Ore- 
gon. The storms continued and the ships, greatly 
j disheartened, again turned southward intending to 
put in at the isle of San Clemente. 

On the way the Victoria disappeared. Ferrelo on 
his own ship, the San Salvador, searched far and 
near but could not find the sister vessel. He then ran 
down to San Diego and, still failing to find the Vic- 
toria, the San Salvador started for home. Far south- 
ward at Cerros the two wandering and sadly buffeted 
vessels came together at last, the crews half -starved. 
On April 18 they again entered the port of Navidad, 
from which they had sailed almost a year before. 

The next man after Cabrillo who appears to have 
left any footprints in California was the famous Eng- 
lish buccaneer. Sir Francis Drake, sometimes less 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 35 

harshly referred to as a **privateersman." Perhaps 
since the asperities of the times are so long ended, 
and in order to offend no one, Drake may be placed 
in history as a gentleman adventurer. His appear- 
ance in California was in the year 1579, thirty-seven 
years after the voyage of Cabrillo. On June 17 of 
that year his ships anchored on the coast at the place 
still known as Sir Francis Drake Bay, where he re- 
mained for a period of thirty-six days overhauling 
and replenishing his vessels and otherwise getting into 
shape for his return voyage to England, laden with 
the spoils of a very successful privateering campaign 
on the Spanish Main. 

During his stay in California, Drake established 
very friendly relations with the Indians. It was to 
assuage the fears of the savages, who regarded the 
white men as gods, that Drake ordered religious ser- 
vices to be performed with the Indians as witnesses 
in order to convey to their minds the idea of the ever- 
lasting God who created heaven and earth and 
reigned above. The important contention is made 
that this was the first Christian service ever held on 
the soil of California, and the contention is one that 
must be regarded as correct except it be true that 
the members of Cabrillo 's expedition in 1542 were 
moved when on shore to hold divine service. It does 
not appear from the records that Cabrillo 's expedi- 
tion carried a chaplain and for this reason historians 
are inclined to the belief that there was no celebra- 
tion of divine service during Cabrillo 's presence in 
California. There is no mention of anything of the 
kind in Cabrillo 's log, which fact greatly strengthens 
the belief that no such ceremony was held. But there 
can be no doubt of the record in Drake 's case, so that 
it is quite certain that the first Christian service ever 
held in California was celebrated by Sir Francis 
Drake and his crew on the shores of the bay bearing 



36 CALIFORNIA 

Ms name, near the headlands of Point Eeyes, in the 
year 1579. 

Drake 's presence in California was purely acciden- 
tal, but he took full advantage of the accident by 
claiming the country for his English Sovereign. 
His presence on the California coast so far north 
from the scenes of his marauding adventures on the 
coast of South America is accounted for by the fact 
that he was looking for a shorter way back to Eng- 
land. He was a victim of the old mistaken belief that 
there was a northern passage from the Atlantic to the 
Pacific as set forth by Juan de Fuca and other splen- 
did romancers of earlier days. Drake failed to find 
the Northwest Passage and returned to the shores of 
his native country by the way of the Pacific. 

His arrival in his native country was made a mat- 
ter of great acclaim. In the first place he was re- 
garded as a hero who had wiped out an old personal 
score against the Spaniards who had some years 
before severely castigated him, also his exploits 
assumed national importance for the reason that the 
English regarded the Spaniards as their enemies and 
therefore subjects upon whom depredations might 
be committed properly, although there was no open 
rupture of war. The Sovereign and the Court 
heaped great honors on Drake and the sight of the 
vast treasures which he had brought home with him 
as the spoils of his adventures aroused the cupidity 
of many other gentlemen of his class. 

It was even thought that the time might come when 
California would be made an English possession. This 
was something that never came about, but it did come 
about that some of Drake 's countrymen imitated his 
exploits on the California coast with varying for- 
tunes. Eminent among these adventurers was 
Thomas Cavendish, described as having been "a 
gentleman of Suffolk" who occupied a high position 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 37 

at the English Court but was in straitened circum- 
stances. He managed to fit out a fleet of three 
vessels with crews numbering one hundred twen- 
ty-three men and sailed from Plymouth in July, 
1586, bound for the Spanish Main. By February he 
had passed the Straits of Magellan and was on the 
way up the west coast of South America, fighting as 
he went along and losing a number of his men, crea- 
ting what depredation he could and seizing what- 
ever spoils were at hand. On his return to England 
he made this boast: "I navigated along the coast of 
ChiU, Peru and New Spain, where I made great 
spoils. I burned and sunk nineteen sail of ships, 
smaU and great. AU the towns and villages that 
ever I landed at, I burned and spoiled." Cavendish 
made another voyage to the scenes of his former 
exploits, in 1591. 

In 1708 Woodes Rogers, another gentleman adven- 
turer, visited these same Pacific waters, creating con- 
siderable havoc. In 1719 Capt. George Shelvoke 
headed a similar expedition, taking back with him 
much valuable data concerning the Indians of the 
New World. He did not manage to get as far north 
as California. 

It must not be supposed that Drake and the other 
English privateers — men who followed him into these 
Pacific waters — visited the coast of North and South 
America for the purpose of exploration. Their pur- 
pose was, instead, solely to gather spoils. When 
Alexander VI, Pope of Rome in the time of Colum- 
bus, drew his famous line of demarcation north and 
south one hundred leagues west of the Cape de Verde 
and Azores Islands, giving the Portuguese all east of 
that line and the Spaniards aU west of it, together 
with rights to each of exclusive navigation, Spanish 
ships carrying on a trade with the Philippines were 
compelled to cross the Pacific. With a knowledge 



38 CALIFORNIA 

of this fact in mind, Drake and the privateersmen 
who succeeded him steered to the western shores of 
the Americas to Lie in wait on the high seas for Span- 
ish vessels laden with treasure, returning from the 
Philippines, homeward bound for Spain. 

No foothold whatever was gained in California by 
the English or any nation, other than Spain, in those 
early days, or in fact, until the occupation by the 
United States, centuries afterwards. Referring 
back, therefore, to the original voyage of discovery 
made by Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo in 1542, we come 
again to the Spaniards as the real explorers and 
ultimately the colonizers of California. Cabrillo 's 
voyage, made only fifty years after the discovery of 
America by Christopher Columbus, shows that Cali- 
fornia had its beginning at an early date in the his- 
tory of the New World. 

Putting aside the mere marauding expeditions of 
the EngUsh privateers who have been mentioned, the 
next important expedition to California was that of 
Sebastian Vizcaino in 1602. The expedition was un- 
dertaken by command of PhiUp III, then King of 
Spain. Vizcaino had four ships and, serving under 
him as Captain General, were the necessary number 
of sailors and soldiers, together with some learned 
men, the purpose being, obviously, to thoroughly ex- 
plore California and, if advisable, to set up there the 
authority of Spain. 

Very great care was taken by this expedition to 
survey every spot along shore that might present 
possibilities for settlement, but no such place was 
found until San Diego was reached on November 10. 
It does not appear that any settlement was then made 
at San Diego but that the whole expedition set forth 
again, touching at Santa Catalina Island and the 
other islands of the coast, anchoring on December 
15, 1602, within the waters sheltered by Point Pinos, 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 39 

finding the place a good harbor and giving it the 
name of Monterey, in honor of the Mexican Viceroy. 

The expedition went ashore at Monterey, where it 

camped for several days, visiting the neighboring 

Indians and exploring the adjacent country. It was 

( during this visit that the first Roman Catholic cele- 

/' bration of divine service took place on the soil of 

California. 

The expedition then sailed north, one of the ships 
reaching latitude 43 degrees and finding the mouth 
of what appeared to be a very large river. The com- 
mander of this ship, Juan Martin de Aguilar, with- 
out attempting to explore the river, immediately 
turned about and hastened back to Mexico where he 
meant to claim that he had found the western en- 
trance to the celebrated straits of Anian, which were 
supposed to lead to the fabled city of Quivira and 
onward to the Atlantic. But, during the passage, 
Aguilar and many of his sailors died from scurvy. 
A month afterward Vizcaino andT the remainder of 
the expedition also returned to Mexico, having ac- 
complished nothing except to gather a great deal of 
valuable information which formed a basis for the 
future Spanish conquest of California. 

In looking backward upon the early explorations, 
the one great fact that stands out more strikingly 
than any other in connection with them is that three 
great sailors each sailed past the very portals of the 
Golden Gate, yet failed to discover the existence of 
the greatest harbor in the world. Cabrillo never 
sailed as far north as San Francisco or possibly he 
might have secured the deathless honor of making 
that great discovery, but after Cabrillo 's death his 
successor, Bartolome Ferrelo, passed the entrance to 
the mighty port unknowingly and, returning south- 
ward, unknowingly passed it again. Sir Francis 
Drake passed it also in the same way and camped for 



40 CALIFORNIA 

a week on shore almost within stone's throw of the 
splendid inland sea, but he never knew it was there. 
Then came Sebastian Vizcaino with no better luck, 
and it seems more than passing strange that these 
three great sailors should so unaccountably have 
missed plucking so great a prize and that the glory 
of it was destined, more than a century and a half 
afterward, to fall unexpectedly into the hands of a 
footsore and weary soldier wandering in quest of the 
lost port of Monterey. 

It was in stirring days such as these that have been 
described that CaHfornia began, as far as the white 
man and his civilization is concerned. When it be- 
gan geologically, who can say? Certainly it is very 
old, perhaps as old as any other portion of the earth 
and it may be that it was the first to emerge from the 
Deluge. In very recent years the remains of pre- 
historic animals unknown to the science of zoology 
have been unearthed from asphaltinn beds in the 
MaHbu hills of Southern California. Still growing 
and vibrant with life are the great Sequoias of the 
north, six thousand years ojd — the oldest living things 
on the face of the earth. Wherefore, who can say 
when California began ? 

Had Cabrillo, when he came in 1542, or the ex- 
plorers and pirates who came afterward, found in 
California an intelligent race of human beings, some 
light on the question as to when California began 
might have been secured if only from traditions. 
But the natives which the white men found here were 
Indian savages of the lowest possible order. They 
knew not from whence they came and had not even 
a theory as to whom their immediate ancestors may 
have been. It is interesting as well as important 
to the story of California that some knowledge of 
the aborigines be had. Cabrillo 's account of them 
is very meager and not at all illuminating. The 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 41 

same may be said of the account given by Vizcaino. 
It is really the English gentlemen adventurers to 
whom we are indebted for the first authentic descrip- 
tion of the Indians of California and their methods 
of life. Other visitors of other nationalities who 
were in California during the days of the Franciscan 
padres also give us entertaining descriptions of the 
Indians. From all these sources it is quite easy to 
get a clear picture of these primitive people. 

Sir Francis Drake has described the Indians he 
met when he was camped under Point Reyes in 1579. 
He relates a visit of state made to him on one occa- 
sion when it appears that the Indians placed a feather 
crown on Drake's head and hung a string of wam- 
pmn about his neck, which he took to mean that they 
desired to make him their chief. While it is thought 
that the famous sailor was somewhat fanciful in his 
account, it is probably in the main quite true. 

According to Sir Francis the Indians who came to 
visit him in state had with them their '*hioh" or 
ruler who was preceded by a sort of scepter-bearer 
in line with the best European usages. The ^'hioh" 
was attired in an elaborate head-dress and a mantle 
of squirrel skins was thrown over his shoulders and 
hung down to his waist. The hioh's attendants also 
wore head-dress, but the multitude of men who fol- 
lowed were entirely naked, their faces painted. The 
women who followed were dressed with extreme scan- 
tiness and it was noticed that the bodies of all of 
them were terribly bruised, their faces torn and their - 
breasts bespattered with blood. 

It seems that the country immediately around San 
Francisco Bay contained a large population of In- 
dians, as was the case throughout all California. 
They were separated into small tribes or families, 
their communities being designated as ''rancherias" 
by the Spaniards. Although separated by short dis- 



42 CALIFORNIA 

tances, the Indians of one rancheria spoke a different 
language from that spoken by even their nearest 
neighbors. They had no houses or tepees and were 
accustomed in the severe weather of winter to cover 
their bodies with mud in order to keep out the cold. 

Very few of the California Indians occupied a 
plane of civilization higher than that of beasts when 
the white men first found them. Some, it is true, 
were a little more intelligent than others. For in- 
stance, the ''Channel Indians," who lived in the 
vicinity of Santa Barbara, built rude shelters for 
themselves in the shape of huts. The Indians found 
on the California islands had some skill in the mak- 
ing of implements and in some instances really fash- 
ioned a sort of pretty jewelry from shells and the 
bones and claws of animals. Occasionally natives were 
found who fished and navigated in a smaU way with 
rude canoes that they had somehow learned to con- 
struct. Like all Indians, the world over, they used 
bows and arrows, and the men of some of the tribes 
were very skilful archers in war and in the hunt. 
Perhaps the best fighting men among them were 
found in the San Joaquin Valley. The physical ap- 
pearance of these natives was not such as to fascinate 
an artist in quest of types of beauty. Men and 
women alike were usually below the average height 
of human beings. They were fat and ungainly, with 
abnormal abdomens but thin shrunken legs, the re- 
sult, no doubt, of an almost nameless diet. They ate 
anything they could lay their hands on, including 
bugs, lizards, grub worms, grasshoppers, carrion and 
raw fish. It made no difference to them in what state 
of decay these things were found, they ate them. 
They had straight coarse black hair, low foreheads, 
small eyes and wide flat noses on wide flat faces. 

They had no names for themselves, no traditions 
and no religion. They were lazy and indolent to a 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 43 

degree and made no attempt whatever to tiU the soil. 
In their dealings with the white men they were much 
given to petty thievery and treachery. On occasion 
they committed murder. The lives they led subjected 
them to many diseases. Such a thing as a marriage 
relation appears to have been almost wholly unknown 
among them and there was no such thing as morals. 

As has been stated, the Indians of the islands were 
the intellectual superiors of those who dwelt on the 
mainland. Concerning them a pathetic tale is told 
which belongs to later years yet which furnishes a 
vivid picture of the manner in which they must have 
existed. It is the story of "The Woman of San 
Nicolas. ' ' 

In the days when the Mission of Santa Barbara 
had attained great strength and power there resided 
on the island of San Nicolas an Indian tribe differ- 
ing in language and in customs from the Indians of 
the mainland. They lived as in a world by them- 
selves and were seldom, if ever, visited by their kins- 
men from across the channel for the reason that the 
Indians of California were not a sea-faring people. 
The most they ever did in the way of seamanship was 
to venture short distances from shore on rafts con- 
structed of tules. 

There came a day when it was decided to transport 
the Indians of the islands to the Mission at Santa 
Barbara in order that they might be under the more 
constant care of the Padres, who desired, of course, 
to civilize and christianize them. So, a ship was 
sent to San Nicolas and the tribe was gathered to- 
gether and put on board. 

But just before the ship sailed an Indian woman 
ran back on the island for her baby, which in the 
excitement she had forgotten. As she did not return 
in a reasonable length of time, and a great storm 



44 CALIFORNIA 

having come up, the ship sailed without her, doubt- 
less with the intention of returning later. 

But the ship never returned, nor any other ship 
for eighteen years. At the end of those years — a 
generation — a boat put into the island, and the boat- 
men saw a strange sight. Awaiting them at the 
water's edge was a creature that resembled nothing 
so much as a huge human bird. It was the forgotten 
woman of San Nicolas clad in a robe of feathers 
which she had woven from the wings and backs of 
wild birds and sea-fowl. 

The experiences of this untutored Indian woman 
who lived so long alone on that island make the ex- 
perience of Robinson Crusoe seem easily plausible. 
There were dogs on San Nicolas and one of these 
appears to have been the only companion the woman 
had. She had made a hut of whalebones, covered it 
with brush and had built a brush fence around it to 
shelter her little home from the winds of the sea. 
She had a plentiful supply of food from abalone and 
other fish. She was a skilful weaver and had made 
many baskets from grass fiber. Her method of kill- 
ing seal was to hunt them at night, stealing up to 
them and killing them with stones. Her fish-lines 
were made from flesh of seals and her hooks from 
abalone shells. She had become very skilful in 
catching birds. 

It was with difficulty that the boat's crew managed 
to capture her, but once captured she became very 
friendly and as playful as a child. Her captors re- 
mained a month on the island hunting otter, and one 
day the woman of San Nicolas was found to have 
built a screen to shield the eyes of a young otter from 
the sun, thus proving her gentleness of heart. 

When at length the woman was brought to Santa 
Barbara she was much terrified at the sight of men 
on horseback and other things connected with the 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 45 

ways of white men which she had never seen before 
or of which she had never heard. The Padres of 
the mission brought Indians from far and near in 
an effort to understand the woman's speech, but it 
was all in vain. No one could grasp the meaning of 
a word she spoke. She was the last of her people. 

Very kind were all the people of Santa Barbara 
to the lost woman of San Nicolas, but in six weeks 
she sickened and died. The captain of the boat, who 
had accomplished her capture and in whose house- 
hold she had been so tenderly cared for, presented the 
Padres at the mission with all her household imple- 
ments, her baskets and grass bottles and her birdskin 
dresses. In turn the Padres sent them with an ac- 
count of her life to the Pope at Rome, where they 
were kept in the museum of the Vatican. 

Here and there other instances are related, similar 
to this, which picture Californian Indians above the 
level of a brute beast, but as a whole these people 
were unspeakably low and degraded, appearing also 
hopelessly stupid to the white men who first saw them 
when California began. 

And this was the material with which Junipero 
Serra and the Franciscan Fathers who came with 
him from Mexico in 1769 had to work. It was from 
this ignorant mass that the Padres brought forth 
skilled artisans, husbandmen, painters, craftsmen 
and musicians. 

THE LOG OF CABRILLO 

Following is a translation of Cabrillo 's log as pub- 
lished in Charles Frederick Holder's book, ''The 
Channel Islands ' ' : 

''Sunday, on the seventeenth of the said month, 
they set sail to pursue their voyage; and about six 
leagues from Cabo de la Cruz they found a good port 
weU inclosed; and to arrive there, they passed by a 



46 CALIFORNIA 

small island which is near the mainland. In this port 
they obtained water in a little pond of rain-water; 
and there are groves resembling silk-cotton trees, ex- 
cept that it is a hard wood. They found thick and 
tall trees which the sea brought ashore. This port 
was called San Mateo (San Diego Bay) . It is a good 
country in appearance. There are large cabins, and 
the herbage is like that of Spain and the land, high 
and rugged. They saw herds of animals like flocks 
of sheep, which went together by the hundred or 
more, which resembled in appearance and movement 
Peruvian sheep, and with long wool. They have 
small horns of a span in length and as thick as the 
thumb, and the tail is broad and round and of the 
length of a pabn. It is in 33 1-3 degrees. They took 
possession of it. They were in this port until the 
following Saturday. 

"Saturday, the twenty-third of the said month, 
they departed from the said port of San Mateo, and 
sailed along the coast until the following Monday, in 
which time they made about eighteen leagues. They 
saw very beautiful valleys and groves, and a country 
flat and rough, and they did not see Indians. 

''On the Tuesday and Wednesday following, they 
sailed along the coast about eight leagues, and passed 
by some three uninhabited islands. One of them is 
larger than the others, and extends two entire leagues, 
and forms a shelter from the west winds. They are 
three leagues from the mainland; they are in 34 
degrees. This day they saw on land great signal 
smokes. It is a good land in appearance, and there 
are great valleys, and in the interior there are high 
ridges. They called them Las Islas Desiertas (the 
Desert Isles). 

''The Thursday following they proceeded about six 
leagues by a coast running north-northwest and dis- 
covered a port inclosed and very good, to which they 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 47 

gave the name of San Miguel (San Pedro Bay). It 
is 34 1-3 degrees ; and after anchoring in it, they went 
on shore, which had people, three of whom remained 
and aU the others fled. To these they gave some pres- 
ents ; and they said by signs that in the interior had 
passed people like the Spaniards. They manifested 
much fear. This same day at night they went on 
shore from the ships to fish with a net ; and it appears 
that there were here some Indians, and they began 
to discharge arrows and wounded three men. 

* ' The next day in the morning they entered further 
within the port, which is large, with the boat, and 
brought away two boys, who understood nothing by 
signs; and they gave them both shirts and immedi- 
ately sent them away. 

''And the following day in the morning there came 
to the ship three large Indians; and by signs they 
said that there were traveling in the interior men like 
us, with beards, and clothed and armed like those of 
the ships ; and they made signs that they carried cross- 
bows and swords, and made gestures with the right 
arm as if they were throwing lances, and went run- 
ning in a posture as if riding on horseback, and made 
signs that they killed many of the native Indians, and 
that for this they were afraid. This people are well 
disposed and advanced. They go covered with the 
skins of animals. Being in this port there passed a 
very great tempest ; but on account of the port's being 
good they suffered nothing. It was a violent storm 
from the west-southwest and southwest. This is the 
first storm which they have experienced. They were 
in this port until the following Tuesday. Here 
Christians were called Guacamal. 

"The following Tuesday, on the third day of the 
month of October, they departed from this port of 
San Miguel ; and Wednesday and Thursday and Fri- 
day they proceeded on their course about eighteen 



48 CALIFORNIA 

leagues, fifty-four miles along the coast, on which 
they saw many valleys and much level ground and 
many large smokes, and, in the interior, sierras. 
They were at dusk near some islands, which are about 
seven leagues from the mainland; and because the 
wind was becalmed they could not reach them this 
night. 

** Saturday, the seventh day of the month of Octo- 
ber, they arrived at the islands at daybreak, which 
they named San Salvador (San Clemente) and La 
Vittoria (Santa Catalina) ; and they anchored off one 
of them; and they went with the boat on shore to 
see if there were people there ; and as the boat came 
near, there issued a great quantity of Indians from 
among the bushes and grass, yelling and dancing and 
making signs that they should come ashore ; and they 
saw that the women were running away; and from 
the boats they made signs that they should have no 
fear; and immediately they assmned confidence and 
laid on the ground their bows and arrows ; and they 
launched a good canoe in the water, which held eight 
or ten Indians, and they came to the ships. They 
gave them beads and little presents, with which they 
were delighted, and they presently went away. The 
Spaniards afterwards went ashore and were very 
secure, they and the Indian women and all. Here an 
old Indian made signs to them that on the mainland 
men were journeying, clothed and with beards like 
the Spaniards. They were in this island only until 
noon. 

''The following Sunday, on the eighth of the said 
month, they came near the mainland in a great bay, 
which they named La Bahia de los Pumos (Bahia 
Ona Bay; recently named Santa Monica Bay) on 
account of the numerous smokes which they saw upon 
it. Here they held intercourse with some Indians, 
whom they took in a canoe, who made signs that to- 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 49 

wards the north there were Spaniards like them. 
This bay is 35 degrees ; and it is a good port ; and the 
country is good, with many valleys and plains and 
trees. 

''The following Monday, on the ninth day of the 
said month of October, they departed from La Bahia 
de los Fmnos (Santa Monica) and proceeded this 
day about six leagues, and anchored in a large inlet 
(lagima near Point Mugu) ; and they passed on 
thence the following day, Tuesday, and proceeded 
about eight leagues on a coast northwest and south- 
east; and they saw on the land a village of Indians 
near the sea and the houses large in the manner of 
those of New Spain ; and they anchored in front of a 
very large valley on the coast. Here came to the 
ships many very good canoes which held in each one 
twelve or thirteen Indians ; and they gave them notice 
of Christians who were journeying in the interior. 
The coast is from northwest to southeast. Here they 
gave them some presents, with which they were much 
pleased. They made signs that in seven days they 
could go where the Spaniards were traveling and 
Juan Rodriguez was determined to send two Span- 
iards to the interior. They also made signs that 
there was a great river (Rio Colorado). With these 
Indians they sent a letter at a venture to the Chris- 
tians. They gave name to this village of El Pueblo 
de las Canoas (The Village of Canoes, near Buena- 
ventura). (Pueblo de las Canoas has usually 
been identified with Santa Barbara but the distance 
places it below that point, while the beautiful valley 
described certainly does not apply to the location of 
Santa Barbara, which can scarcely be said to be in 
a valley at all. The Santa Clara Valley and moun- 
tains agree exactly with the description.) They go 
covered with some skins of animals ; they are fishers 
and eat the fish raw; they also eat agaves. This 



50 CALIFORNIA 

village is 35 1-3 degrees. The country within is a 
very beautiful vaUey ; and they made signs that there 
was in that valley much maize and much food. There 
appear within this valley some sierras very high, and 
the land is very rugged. They caU the Christians 
Taquimine. Here they took possession; here they 
remained until Friday, the thirteenth day of the said 
month. 

''Friday, the thirteenth day of the said month of 
October, they departed from Pueblo de las Canoas 
on their voyage, and proceeded this day six or seven 
leagues and passed two large islands (Anacapa and 
Santa Cruz Islands), which extend four leagues each 
one, and are four leagues from the continent. They 
are uninhabited, because there is no water in them, 
and they have good ports. The coast of the main- 
land runs west-northwest; the country is level, with 
many cabins and trees; and the following Saturday 
they continued on their course, and proceeded two 
leagues, no more ; and they anchored opposite a val- 
ley very beautiful and very populous, the land being 
level, with many trees. Here came canoes with fish 
to barter; they remained great friends. 

''And the Sunday following, the fifteenth day of 
the said month, they held on their voyage along the 
coast, about ten leagues, and there were always many 
canoes, for all the coast is very populous ; and many 
Indians were continually coming aboard the ship; 
and they pointed out to us the villages, and named 
them by their names, which are Xucu, Bis, Sopono, 
Alloc, Xabaagua, Xotococ, Potoltuc, Nacbuc, Quel- 
queme, Misinagua, Misesopano, Elquis, Coloc, Mugu, 
Xagua, Anacbuc, Partocac, Susuquey, Quanmu, Gua, 
Asimu, Auguin, Casalic, Tucumu, Incpupu. All 
these villages extend from the first, Pueblo de las 
Canoas, which is called Xucu, as far as this place; 
they are in a very good country, with very good plains 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 51 

and many trees and cabins; they go clothed with 
skins ; they said that inland there were many towns, 
and much maize at three days' distance; they called 
the maize oet; and also that there were many cows 
(elk). They call the cows cae; they also gave them 
notice of some people with beards and clothes. They 
passed this day along the shore of a large island 
which is fifteen leagues in length ; and they said that 
it was very populous, and that it contained the fol- 
lowing villages: Niquitos, Maxul, Xugua, Nitel, 
Macamo, Nimitotal. They named the island San 
Nicolas (Santa Rosa Island) ; it is from this place 
to Pueblo de las Canoas eighteen leagues ; the island 
is from the continent six leagues. 

''Monday, the sixteenth day of said month, sail- 
ing along the coast, they proceeded four leagues and 
anchored in the evening opposite two villages; and 
also this day canoes were continually coming to the 
ship ; and they made signs that farther on there were 
canoes much larger. 

"The Tuesday following, the seventeenth day of 
the said month, they proceeded three leagues with 
fair weather; and there were with the ship from 
daybreak many canoes ; and the Captain continually 
gave them many presents; and all this coast where 
Qiey have passed is very populous ; they brought them 
a large quantity of fresh sardines very good; they 
say that inland there are many villages and much 
food ; these did not eat any maize ; they went clothed 
with skins and wear their hair very long and tied up 
with cord very long and placed within the hair ; and 
these strings have many small daggers attached of 
flint and wood and bones. The land is very excellent 
in appearance. 

"Wednesday, the eighteenth day of the said month, 
they went running along the coast until ten o'clock, 
and saw all the coast populous ; and, because a fresh 



52 CALIFORNIA 

wind sprung up, canoes did not come. They came 
near a point which forms a cape Like a galley, and 
they named it Cabo de Galera, and it is in a little 
over 36 degrees ; and because there was a fresh north- 
west wind they stood off from the shore and discov- 
ered two islands, the one large, which has eight 
leagues of coast running east and west (Santa Rosa), 
but with only five leagues of coast running as de- 
scribed; the other has four leagues (San Miguel), 
with only two leagues, and in this small one there is 
a good port (Cuyler's harbor), and they are peopled; 
they are ten leagues from the continent; they are 
called Las Islas de San Lucas. From the mainland 
to Cabo de Galera it runs west by northeast; and 
from Pueblo de las Canoas to Cabo de Galera there 
is a very populous province, they call it Xexu ; it has 
many languages different from each other ; they have 
many great wars with each other ; it is from El Pueblo 
de las Canoas to El Cabo de Galera thirty leagues; 
they were in these islands until the following Wed- 
nesday because it was very stormy. 

** Wednesday, the twenty-fifth of the said month, 
they departed from the said islands from the one 
which was more to the windward ; it has a very good 
port so that from all the storms of the sea no dam- 
age will be suffered from those within its shelter; 
they called it La Posesion (San Miguel previously, 
with Santa Rosa, called Las Islas de San Lucas). 

''Thursday, on the twenty-third day of the month, 
they approached on a backward course the islands of 
San Lucas, and one of them named La Posesion 
(San Miguel) ; and they ran along all the coast, point 
by point, from El Cabo de Pinos to them, and they 
found no harbor, so that of necessity they had to 
return to the said island, on account of having these 
days a very high west-northwest wind, and the swell 
of the sea was very great. From Cabo de Martin to 



WHEN CALIFORNIA BEGAN 53 

Cabo de Pinos they saw no Indians, because of the 
coast's being bold and without harbor and rugged; 
and on the southeast side of Cabo de Martin for fif- 
teen leagues they found the country inhabited, and 
many smokes, for the land is good ; but from El Cabo 
de Martin as far as to forty degrees they saw no sign 
of Indians. El Cabo de San Martin is in 371/2 de- 
grees. 

"While wintering in this Isla de Posesion (San 
Miguel), on the third day of January, 1543, departed 
from this present life Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo, Cap- 
tain of the said ships, from a fall which he had on the 
same island at the former time when they were there, 
by which he broke an arm near the shoulder. He left 
for captain the chief pilot, who was one Bartolome 
Ferrelo, a native of Levant; and he charged them 
much at the time of his death that they should not 
give up the discovery, as far as possible, of all the 
coast. They named the island La Isla de Juan Rod- 
riguez. The Indians call this island Liqui Muymu, 
and another they call Nicalque, and the other they 
call Limu. In this island De la Posesion there are 
two villages; the one is called Zaco and the other 
NimoUoUo. On one of the other islands there are 
three villages; one they call Nichochi, and another 
Coycoy, and the other Estocoloco. On the other 
island there are ten villages, which are Miqueses- 
quelua, Poele, Pisqueno, Pualnacatup, Patiquiu, 
Patiquilid, Ninumu, Muoc, Pilidquay, Lilibeque. 

' ' TTie Indians of these islands are very poor. They 
are fishermen; they eat nothing but fish; they sleep 
on the ground ; all their business and employment is 
to fish. In each house they say there are fifty souls. 
They live very swinishly. They go naked. They 
were in these islands from the twenty-third of No- 
vember to the nineteenth of January. In all this 
time, which was almost two months, iliere were very 



54 CALIFORNIA 

hard wintry storms on the land and sea. The winds 
which prevailed most were west-southwest, and south- 
southwest, and west-northwest. The weather was 
very tempestuous. ' ' 




HANGING THE INHSSION BKLL 
(From a Painting by George Stone) 



Ill 

THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 

THE story of the conception, foundation, the 
rise and the fall of the Franciscan Mission 
establishments in California is at once one of 
the most unique, colorful and romantic stories in the 
annals of human history, and one of the most im- 
portant. 

In order to bear out the truth of this statement, it 
should be necessary only to state the plain, concrete 
fact of history that the result of this splendid adven- 
ture was to snatch from the darkness and ignorance 
of heathenism a whole savage race, lifting it into the 
light and intelligence of civilization and Christianity. 
The story is all the more wonderful because of the 
fact that the Indians of California, when found by 
the Franciscans in the year 1769, were little above 
the level of the most degraded physical beings and 
the most mentally slothful human creatures on the 
face of the earth. A more hopeless task was never 
attempted by the agencies of religion and civilization, 
yet the results accomplished were as astounding as 
any that have ever been accomplished under the most 
auspicious circumstances and with the most suscep- 
tive and noble of savage races to work upon. The 
Jesuits and other missionaries to America never 
accomplished more, and in many instances they ac- 
complished far less, with the Iroquois, Sioux and 
other tribes that were really so noble in their primi- 
tive characters as to be called almost enlightened, 
than the Franciscans accomplished in California with 
Indians who spoke a different tongue in every vil- 



56 CALIFORNIA 

lage, who had not even learned to clothe themselves, 
whose physical and moral habits were filthy in the 
extreme and who had been saved from annihilation 
solely by the kindliness of the climate in which they 
lived. 

From this pathetic material the Franciscans 
evolved civilized men and women whom they taught 
to read and write, to sing, to play upon musical in- 
struments, to carve in wood, to paint pictures and to 
follow agriculture and the crafts of the artisan with 
striking success. And to add further to an achieve- 
ment so wonderful that it almost deserves the title 
of a miracle, the work was all done well within the 
period of a single generation. 

Prior to the year 1769, the Jesuits had founded 
and erected many missions among the Indians of 
Baja or Lower California. The work of that great 
Order there was of the utmost importance and fur- 
nishes a luminous page in the history of civilization. 
But in the year 1767 a decree of the Spanish Cortes 
expelling the Jesuits from Mexico was enforced and 
their missions were offered to the Franciscans, who 
immediately supplanted the Jesuits. It was then, 
also, that the old dream of the military, civil and 
religious conquests of Alta or Upper California was 
vigorously revived. Two years after the accession 
of the Franciscans the conquest of Upper California 
was fully decided upon. This decision, as well as the 
effective manner in which it was carried out, may be 
said to have been due almost whoUy to the faith and 
splendid vigor of two men, Don Jose Galvez, the 
Visitador General of Mexico, and Fra Junipero 
Serra. 

In Galvez, the Spanish Government had at last 
found a man possessed of the military genius to set 
the conquest of Upper California in motion. The 
great problem which faced Galvez was to find a relig- 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 57 

ious coadjutor, equally vigorous, courageous and with 
a genius as great as his own, to assist him. The mili- 
tary and the religious conquests of California had to 
go hand in hand. The one could not move without the 
other. Galvez found his man in Junipero Serra. 

Galvez and Serra were molded from much the 
same clay. Both were enthusiasts. The Visitador 
General, unlike some of the representatives of the 
Spanish Crown in the New World at that time, was a 
deeply religious man. First of all, he was a vigor- 
ous, effective and highly successful military and civil 
executive, carrying out every trust placed in his 
hands to the entire satisfaction of the King. But he 
was, as well, a loyal son of the Church ; indeed, a pious 
man. And while the duty imposed directly and par- 
ticularly on him was to secure possession of Upper 
California for the Spanish Crown and to direct the 
military and civil operations necessary to maintain 
the dignity of the Crown in the new country and to 
hold the same, he was, nevertheless, as eager for the 
religious conquest of the new land as was Serra. As 
a consequence the two men got along famously, work- 
ing together with the utmost harmony and enthusi- 
asm. But as far as Serra was personally concerned, 
the military aspect of the expedition appealed to him 
only as he deemed it necessary to aid him in carrying 
out his work of religious conquest. Serra was a true 
Franciscan, glorying in his vows of poverty. The 
material wealth of the new country toward which 
he was bound, whatever that wealth might prove to 
be, appealed to him not at all. What he looked for- 
ward to, alone, was the acquisition of the heathen for 
Christ. And to accomplish this desire, his heart and 
soul were inflamed with an unquenchable zeal. 

Early in the summer of the year 1768 Galvez got 
into action. Embarking from San Bias with a large 
force he proceeded to Santa Ana, a place near La 



58 CALIFORNIA 

Paz, where he arrived on July 6. Father Junipero 
was then at Loreto, the famous shrine of the Madonna 
of the Pearls. Galvez immediately sent word to 
Junipero to join him in the camp at Santa Ana. 
Junipero immediately set out on foot to answer the 
simimons, a distance of nearly two hundred and fifty 
miles, over a wild, rough and dangerous country, 
arriving in due time, safely. 

It is fascinating to look back into the dim and misty 
past and picture these two very remarkable men 
planning and dreaming one of the most fateful em- 
prises in the history of human endeavor. As they 
sat in Galvez 's tent in the camp at La Paz, they had 
before them the map of the coast of California, pre- 
served from the immortal voyage of Sebastian 
Vizcaino, made in the year 1602, one hundred and 
sixty-six years before. They noted the points along 
the golden coast at which Vizcaino had touched — San 
Diego's Harbor of the Sun, the smoky little estuary 
of San Pedro, Santa Catalina's Magic Isle, the sun- 
swept channel and the dreamy isles of Santa Bar- 
bara, cape and headlands and swinging shores away 
north beyond Mendocino. 

We see Don Jose Galvez, type of the Spanish con- 
quistadore that brought half the world into subjec- 
tion under the bright blue banner of Castile and 
Leon. Plumed and bucklered, he searches the map 
with his keen yet kindly eye, his heart warming with 
the great dream. Facing him sits Father Junipero, 
sandaled and wearing the rough brown robe of his 
Order. 

It was not destined that Galvez should accompany 
the conquest. His task was to fit the expedition out 
and to send it with a Godspeed on its way; but the 
fact that he was not to go, did not lessen his enthu- 
siasm. As soon as he had agreed with Junipero on 
all the necessary details of their great plan, he set 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 59 

himself with a restless energy to put the expedition in 
the best possible shape. He even worked with his 
own hands at loading and repairing the ships, and 
reserved for himself as a dear and precious privilege 
the selection of articles necessary for use and orna- 
mentation in the new churches that were to be built, 
especially articles for the altar and the vestments 
for the priests. Finally, he selected the sites on the 
coast as shown by Vizcaino's map, at which the first 
three Missions were to be erected. These were as 
f oUows : The first at San Diego, the second at Mon- 
terey and a third in between, to be known as San Bue- 
naventura. It was then, when Galvez had selected 
these sites and had given names to the new Missions 
to be established, that a conversation took place be- 
tween the priest and the soldier which is remembered 
to this day in California. 

^'Don Jose," said Father Junipero, "you have 
named a Mission for San Diego de Alcala, another 
in honor of San Carlos at Monterey and a third for 
San Buenaventura. But is there to be no Mission 
in honor of our Father St. Francis?" 

''If St. Francis desires a Mission," answered Don 
Jose, with a smile, "let him show us his harbor." 

As matters turned out, St. Francis did in due time 
show his harbor and, as it proved, it was a harbor 
well worthy of him— the greatest of all the harbors 
of the world. It also turned out that the successful 
launching of this expedition, due so much to the 
energy, the courage and the faith of Don Jose Gal- 
vez, practically ended his connection with the story 
of the Franciscan Missions of California. 

On the other hand, however, the connection of 
Junipero Serra with the emprise was just to begin, 
and, as he came to be the soul of it, it is important 
that we shall know at the very beginning the kind 



60 CALIFORNIA 

of man lie was whose name is, to this day, the best 
knoAvn and the best loved name in California. 

Miguel Jose Serra was born in the village of Petra 
on the Isle of Majorca, November 24, 1713, and was, 
therefore, fifty-six years of age when he left La Paz 
to become the founder and first president of the Fran- 
ciscan Missions in Alta California. His parents 
were pious people and quite poor. Even as a child, 
Serra, by his gentleness and piety, gave promise of 
his future career in the Church ; and because of this, 
the inability of his parents to pay for his education 
was overcome by the Church gratuitously taking him 
in charge. He was instructed in Latin and taught to 
sing in his native village and was afterwards taken 
to Palma, the capital of the Island, where his edu- 
cation was completed. 

Reading with great avidity books that dealt with 
the lives of saints and the labors of apostles, and 
being of a very imaginative and impressionable 
mind, young Serra early determined to become a 
missionary among heathen savages, going so far in 
his meditations as to crave secretly the crown of 
martyrdom. 

An easy index to the man's nature is gained by 
the fact that upon entering the Franciscan Order he 
chose the name of Junipero. It will be remembered 
that among the disciples whom St. Francis had about 
him at Assisi was a lay-brother known as Brother 
Juniper, renowned in the chronicles of the place as 
the "Jester of the Lord." It was Brother Juniper 
who tried to outdo St. Francis himself in minis- 
trations to the poor. Nothing in the larders of the 
community was safe from Brother Juniper's hands, 
if there were anywhere near Assisi a hungry mouth. 
Once he was caught stripping the golden lace from 
the cloth of the altar that he might sell it and, with 
the money, buy bread for the poor. So impressed 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 61 

was young Serra with this quaint character that upon 
assuming the brown robe of the brotherhood he him- 
self took the name of Junipero. 

Serra proved himself to be a most remarkable 
student. Before he had reached his majority he was 
not only ordained to the priesthood but taught in the 
colleges as a professor of theology and had obtained 
the degree of Doctor. He became noted as one of the 
most eloquent pulpit orators of Europe and was 
sought after even by the Court itself. Although in 
boyhood he was frail, delicate and undersized, he 
became tall and robust as he grew older. He was 
sought out by every source that had honors to con- 
fer and it is said that a Cardinalate would have been 
within his easy reach had he remained in Spain ; but 
knowing all these things, he still clung with greater 
fervor than ever to his boyhood's desire to become a 
missionary to the heathen savage. Consequently, at 
the first opportunity he left Spain in company with 
Francisco Palou, a brother priest, his life-long friend 
and biographer and for a short time his successor in 
California after Junipero 's death. It is related that 
their voyage was a tempestuous one and that during 
a great storm at sea, Serra, by his personal courage 
and great religious faith, calmed the fears of crew 
and passengers and thus averted a serious catas- 
trophe. 

With Father Palou as his assistant, Serra reached 
the College of San Fernando in Mexico on January 
1, 1750. After a sojourn of five months there, the 
two friends gladly accepted a call to go to the Sierra 
Gorda, a long distance northward where a Mission 
had been founded some six years previously. The 
Sierra Gorda was then, as it is now, a most desolate, 
wild and inhospitable region, yet never went man 
more gladly to a wedding feast in a palace than Juni- 
pero Serra went upon this dangerous mission. There 



62 CALIFORNIA 

among the savages whose language he learned and 
to whom he imparted a knowledge of his own musical 
tongue, the man who might have remained at home in 
the Old World, surrounded by every luxury and with 
all the honors of Rome heaped high upon him, taught 
the heathen savage in the vast desolation of the 
Sierra Gorda for nine long years with the faithful 
Palou at his side. And when at length he left those 
bleak hills to return under orders to the City of Mex- 
ico, the Mission of which he had been in charge had 
become the model Mission of the country. The con- 
version of the heathen was quite complete ; the naked 
were clothed, the hungry were fed and the light of 
God and civilization was burning brightly in the 
souls and minds of the poor wretches to whom he had 
come as a savior. That his labors had been attended 
by untold hardships goes without saying, and as a 
proof of it he went away from the Sierra Gorda with 
a wound on his leg that never healed and that caused 
him constant pain to the day he died. 

For several years more Father Junipero labored 
throughout Mexico in the Missions and elsewhere 
until, at length, as has been noted, he arrived at La 
Paz for the meeting with Galvez and to prepare him- 
self for his labors in the new and quite unknown land 
of Alta California. 

After many months of great exertion the expedi- 
tion was ready to start. Three ships were in condi- 
tion to make the voyage — two of them to be sent out 
together and the third to be sent later as a relief ship. 
It will be well to keep this third ship in mind because 
it plays a part in a most dramatic incident. 

The two ships that were to sail upon the appointed 
day carried a portion of the troops, the camping out- 
fit, the ornaments for the new churches that were to 
be builded, a goodly supply of provisions and car- 
goes of agricultural implements with which the In- 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 63 

dians in the new country were to be taught to tiU the 
soil. Simultaneously with the sailing of the ships 
two land parties started out, one somewhat in ad- 
vance of the other, their purpose being mainly to 
pick up cattle and sheep at Loreto and to bring them 
with them to stock the new country. Four mission- 
aries went on the ship, but Father Junipero decided 
to go with the second land party. With him was 
the newly appointed governor, Don Gaspar de Por- 
tola. On January 9, 1769, Don Jose Galvez, Visi- 
tador General, assembled all the people together who 
were to set out on the great adventure, both by land 
and sea. He addressed them in feeling words, stir- 
ring their hearts as best he could to meet bravely 
whatever dangers might await them. Father Juni- 
pero then administered the sacrament, blessed the 
ship and placed the whole expedition under the 
guidance of St. Joseph, the patron saint of California. 

The first ship to sail was the San Carlos, a bark 
of some two hundred tons burden, under the com- 
mand of Vicente ViUa. On this ship were also the 
surgeon, Pedro Prat; Father Fernando Paron, one 
of the Franciscan missionaries; twenty Catalonian 
soldiers under command of Lieutenant Pedro Fages ; 
and many other important personages, and also a 
blacksmith, a baker and a cook. 

As soon as Galvez had the satisfaction of seeing 
the San Carlos well on its way, he started the second 
vessel which was known as the San Antonio. It was 
on January 11, 1769, that Galvez saw the last of the 
San Carlos and it was on February 15, following, 
that he started the San Antonio under command of 
Juan Perez with two additional Franciscan Fathers, 
Francisco Gomez and Juan Vizcaino. 

The two land expeditions were by this time also 
upon their way, but by the time the second expedition 
reached San Xavier, in Lower California, the old 



64 CALIFORNIA 

wound in Father Junipero's leg became so troub- 
lesome and so cruelly painful that Father Palou 
advised him to remain at San Xavier until he should 
be in better condition to proceed. But to this pro- 
posal Junipero would give no heed. 

*'Let us speak no more upon the subject," he said. 
'*I have placed my faith in God and trust in His 
goodness to plant the standard of the Holy Cross not 
only at San Diego but even as far as Monterey." 

In a few days Junipero's party resumed its jour- 
ney, traversing the wild mountain districts and desert 
plains of Lower California, stopping now and then 
at previously established Missions, Father Junipero 
suffering intensely all the time imtil one of the mule- 
teers, by applying tallow mixed with herbs to the 
wound, accomplished a surprising and most welcome 
measure of relief. Some of the Indians died upon 
the way. Several of the soldiers deserted. But at 
last on July 1, 1769, Junipero Serra and Don Caspar 
de Portola came with swelling hearts in view of the 
long-sought port of San Diego. 

The two ships sent out from La Paz by Galvez were 
rocking joyously in the bright Harbor of the Sun, 
their crews and passengers were on shore and the 
first land party under command of Captain Fer- 
nando Rivera y Moncada had also arrived at the port. 

As the second land party with Father Junipero 
and Governor Portola came within view of the desti- 
nation for which the whole expedition had set out, 
and as they saw that every other arm of the enter- 
prise had fared successfully, the ships lying with 
folded sails in the lovely, peaceful harbor, the tents 
of the voyagers by sea and the wayfarers by land set 
up and waiting with welcome in the clasp of the 
brown hills of the shore, Junipero Serra experienced 
then one of the happiest hours of his life. Portola 
ordered his soldiers to fire their guns to attract the 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 65 

attention of those already in San Diego and the camp 
immediately responded with salvos from cannon on 
the decks of the ships and the rattle of musketry 
from the Catalonian soldiers in the newly founded 
presidio. The whole camp went forth to meet Por- 
tola and Junipero and there was great rejoicing. 

This day, forever memorable, may be considered 
as the natal day of California. White men had been 
in San Diego before — Cabrillo's expedition in 1542 
and the expedition of Vizcaino in 1602 — ^but they 
came merely to explore, and with no idea whatever of 
attempting colonization or even temporary settle- 
ment. They left nothing behind them save little 
stone monuments here and there on the golden coast 
to bear record of their visits. 

All told, the expedition now safely arrived at San 
Diego numbered one hundred and thirty souls, but 
many of these were sick or hurt and were under 
the constant care of Pedro Prat, the surgeon. Those 
whose cases were most serious were put on board the 
San Antonio and sent back to Mexico, leaving the 
other ship, the San Carlos, to remain. In a few 
days, as soon as the camp was as well bestowed as 
possible, Father Junipero and Portola went into 
conference in order to decide upon the next step to 
be taken, which was to find the Port of Monterey 
and there establish the second Mission according to 
the instructions of Don Jose Galvez. 

The original intention was to proceed from San 
Diego to Monterey by water, but it was now discov- 
ered that the San Carlos was in bad condition and by 
no means seaworthy, so that the only alternative, if 
haste were to be made, was to send a party by land 
to find Monterey and to gain a footing there. The 
plan agreed upon then was that Father Junipero 
should remain in San Diego and begin the first Mis- 
sion, while Portola was to place himself in conomand 



66 CALIFORNIA 

of the overland party wMch was forthwith to start 
out in search of Monterey. Accordingly, on July 14, 
this overland expedition started out, Portola in com- 
mand. Also in the party were the two Franciscan 
Fathers, Crespi and Gomez, Capt. Rivera y Moncada, 
Lieutenant Fages, Costanso, the engineer, and Ser- 
geant Jose Francisco de Ortega, together with a num- 
ber of soldiers, Indian servants from Lower Califor- 
nia and Old Mexico, and muleteers, the whole com- 
pany numbering sixty-four persons. 

Thus on July 14, 1769, began from San Diego the 
historic march of Don Gaspar de Portola and his 
men on the vain and fruitless search for Monterey, 
but which resulted in the discovery of another and a 
greater harbor that made the name of Portola im- 
mortal. 

Never was there port so elusive as that same Mon- 
terey that now the whole world knows so well. The 
trouble was that Cabrillo had made an error in his 
reckonings when he placed Monterey on his map, and, 
because of this, Portola was led a sorry chase when 
he set out from San Diego. For weeks and weeks 
the party marched through valleys beautiful with 
oak and sycamore, redolent with the perf lune of wild 
flowers and vibrant with the songs of thrush and 
linnet and mocking-bird; for weeks and weeks they 
climbed the brown hills shining with the splendor of 
the dawn, royal with sunset's purple and diademed 
with the jeweled stars of night — but still no sign of 
Monterey gleaming in glory among her cypressed 
shores. 

And it came to pass that on the first day of Novem- 
ber in that fateful year, 1769, Portola 's expedition 
had marched far beyond the spot it was seeking. 
Every morning and every last look at evening from 
the hills showed stiU no crescent cut of shore or 
estuary that could be hailed as Monterey even by the 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 67 

wildest flight of the imagination. Sickness and 
weariness had made pathetic inroads on Portola's 
ranks, the men who stiU remained strong carrying on 
Litters those who could no longer keep up the heart- 
brealdng pace. 

At last the brave little band reached that spot from 
which the fascinated traveler of today, trekking from 
the south, may look out upon the great ocean, behold- 
ing Point Reyes to the northward and the rocky 
islets of the Farallones in the cobwebs of the mists, 
off shore. 

There Portola pitched a camp and sent Ortega, 
his sergeant, to explore. Some soldiers who were 
left in camp resolved to go forth on a forage, which 
they did, and as they returned, near evening, they 
fired their guns to apprise Portola that they came 
with great news. They reported having seen a vast 
arm of the sea which stretched far inland. Was it 
Monterey, at last? New hopes inspired the expedi- 
tion and the coming of morning was most eagerly 
and restlessly awaited. 

The rest of the story is soon told. Pushing east- 
ward, next day, across the hills, Gaspar de Portola 
and his companions looked down, not upon Monterey, 
but upon the dancing waters of the Bay of St. Fran- 
cis and the bronze portals of the Golden Gate ! 

In imagination we can see them still — that little 
band of immortal pathfinders — dumb with wonder 
on the brown and windy hill, drinking in with enrap- 
tured eyes the far-flung splendor of the mightiest 
harbor in all the world. There stands Portola, wide- 
eyed and swart of face under his plumed hat. Beside 
him are his officers, Moncada, Fages, Costanso and 
Ortega in short velvet jackets, slashed breeches, 
bright sashes and gold lace; the two brown-robed, 
sandaled Franciscan Fathers, Crespi and Gomez ; the 
soldiers in their leather coats ; the rough, sombreroed 

..D .. 



68 CALIFORNIA 

muleteers and the half -naked Indians brought from 
Baja California in the far south. 

Backward now marched Portola to San Diego with 
the disheartening report that he had failed in his 
effort to establish a Mission at Monterey. But when 
he told of the tremendously greater harbor he had 
found, Father Serra was wildly elated. 

"Ah," he cried, "the challenge that Galvez flimg 
at me has been answered. Our Father St. Francis 
has made known his port to us. We shall name it 
San Francisco in his honor, and we will build a Mis- 
sion there." 

Portola 's expedition had been absent on its great 
quest for a period of eight months; it returned to 
San Diego early in March, 1770, sadly the worse 
for the hard experience which it had undergone. It 
had left behind it a path of grief, and the majority 
were poor wanderers incapacitated by sickness. The 
Governor was deeply discouraged and had been 
buoyed up alone by the hope that he would find cheer- 
ing news upon his return to San Diego. 

But in this he was terribly disappointed. During 
the eight months of his absence Father Junipero had 
accomplished practically nothing more than the cere- 
monious foundation of the first Mission. Not one 
Indian neophyte had been secured from the hundreds 
of natives in the surrounding country. The camp 
had been frequently attacked by the savages who 
wounded many and had slain one of the Mission 
defenders. There had been a great deal of sickness, 
and the new Mission establishment was on the verge 
of starvation. 

Don Caspar de Portola, the Governor, was not 
slow to grasp the true situation and to make up his 
mind what action to take. He ordered all hands on 
board the San Carlos that the entire expedition might 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 69 

return at once to Old Mexico while it was still possi- 
ble to do so. 

Serra was dismayed, and pleaded with all his soul 
against the abandonment. At last they gave him one 
more day to remain — just one little day more — and 
then he must put away his dream and sail south with 
the ships. 

Now Galvez, in New Spain, had promised to send 
a relief ship in due time to San Diego, but the time 
had long passed and no one hoped for it any more. 
Doubtless it had been lost, they said, as others of 
their ships had been lost. Certainly it had not come 
when Galvez said it would come. It might be he had 
kept his word and had sent the ship, but it was with 
the fishes at the bottom of the sea these many months. 
A child might know as much. 

But the situation had one indomitable soul still to 
reckon with. Junipero Serra could not give up ; he 
would go to God for help and pray to Him for succor 
across the blue waves. On the morning of that ''last 
day" he cHmbed to the topmost pinnacle of Presidio 
Hill and stormed the white gates of Heaven with sup- 
plicating prayers for San Diego, even as the garrison 
was feverishly packing whatever was worth the car- 
rying away. The record of that day is told in 
Smythe 's vivid history of San Diego : 

''Father Serra went up to the hilltop on that fate- 
ful morning and turned his eyes to the sea as the sun 
rose. All day long he watched the waste of waters 
as they lay in the changing light. It was a scene of 
marvelous beauty, and as he watched and prayed, 
Junipero Serra doubtless felt that he drew very close 
to the Infinite. So devout a soul, in such desperate 
need, facing a scene of such nameless sublimity, could 
not have doubted that somewhere just below the curve 
of the sea lay a ship, with God's hand pushing it on 
to starving San Diego. And as the sun went down 



70 CALIFORNIA 

he caught sight of a sail — a ghostly sail, it seemed, in 
the far distance. Who can ever look upon the height 
above the old Presidio, when the western sky is glow- 
ing and twilight stealing over the hills, without see- 
ing Father Serra on his knees pouring out his prayer 
of thanksgiving." 

Thus was wrought what, in the tents of the faithful, 
is called a ''miracle," and by what better name shall 
the Gentiles caU it ? Did not Junipero Serra ask for 
another day, and did not the day bring the ship to 
** starving San Diego?" 

And what does that day mean to California and the 
world? It means that, had it never been, the won- 
derful Franciscan Missions of California had never 
risen, standing as they do today, most of them in ruin, 
but still the most priceless heritage of the Common- 
wealth. Came never that day on Presidio Hill with 
Junipero Serra on his knees, there would have been 
no Mission San Diego de Alcala in the Mission Val- 
ley, no Pala in the mountain valleys, no San Luis 
Rey, no San Gabriel or Santa Barbara's towers 
watching above the sea, no San Luis Obispo or 
Dolores or any of the twenty-one marvelous struc- 
tures that dot El Camino Real — "The King's High- 
way" — between the Harbor of the Sun and the Val- 
ley of the Seven Moons, and which to see, untold 
thousands of travelers make the pilgrimage to Cali- 
fornia every year. 

With the arrival of the relief ship confidence and 
courage were again restored. All thought of aban- 
doning the great emprise now faded from everybody's 
mind. Father Junipero, who had declared to Por- 
tola that he would remain alone in California, now 
found his companions willing and glad to remain 
with him. He preached a great sermon to them at 
Mass, strengthening their faith in God by his own 
sublime faith and moving them to tears of gratitude 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 71 

as he could so well do with his marvelous eloquence. 
He spoke of the beauty of the land to which they had 
come. Plucking up a wild rose from its stem he said : 
'*Even the roses here are like the roses of Castile." 

But Father Junipero was now eager to be on his 
way to the lost Port of Monterey where he had de- 
cided to establish the headquarters of all the Mis- 
sions. Taking Vizcaino's old maps he clearly ex- 
plained to Portola how he had missed his quest and 
assured him that this time there would be no diffi- 
culty. So, leaving behind him at San Diego a chosen 
company to care for the Mission there, Junipero and 
Portola started for Monterey. In the party left at 
San Diego were Fathers Parron and Gomez, the Com- 
mander of the ship, Vicente Villa, with five sailors, a 
small number of neophyte Indians from Lower Cali- 
fornia and eight soldiers in charge of Sergeant 
Ortega. 

This new expedition to Monterey was divided into 
two parties, one to go by water on the newly arrived 
ship which proved to be the San Antonio ; the other 
party to go by land. Father Jimipero, true Fran- 
ciscan that he was, decided to accompany the land 
party. In those days and for years afterwards the 
members of the Order of St. Francis invariably 
made their journeys on foot and declined to ride in 
any kind of conveyance unless absolutely forced to 
do so. With Father Junipero and Governor Portola 
were a number of soldiers, neophytes and muleteers. 

The land party reached Point Pinos, May 24, 1770, 
and on June 3, following. Father Junipero celebrated 
the Mass under the same oak tree on the shores of 
the Bay of Monterey where that same ceremony had 
been performed by the chaplain of the Vizcaino expe- 
dition one hundred sixty-eight years before; but 
the party which left San Diego in the San Antonio 
at the same time the land party started, did not reach 



72 CALIFORNIA 

Monterey for a month and a half afterward, owing to 
the fact that the ship had been buffeted by the winds 
and driven from its course. 

There could be no question now that the lost port 
of Monterey had been refound. The cross that Por- 
tola had erected on his previous journey was still 
standing, his records buried imder it, unharmed and 
undisturbed. The wondering Indians who came 
down told the strangers that the mystic cross had 
been left unmolested because of the awe in which 
they held it. They said that at night it had always 
shone with a strange and heavenly brightness that 
could be seen for many miles. They hung fish 
and berries upon it by day, thinking thus to pro- 
pitiate it, as they would one of their own gods. Again 
they thought it was angry with them, and they came 
and buried their arrows beside it in the sand to show 
that they were at peace with the Holy Cross. And 
never had sacrilegious hand been laid upon it. 

June 3, 1770, was the first great day in the history 
of Monterey — a history destined to be filled with 
many great days. It was upon that date that Father 
Junipero Serra founded there his own Mission of 
San Carlos with the celebration of the Mass, the 
singing of the Te Deum Laudamus and all the stately 
ceremonial of the Roman ritual. On the same day 
the royal standard of Charles III, King of Spain, 
was unfurled and saluted by salvos of artillery, and 
California claimed for the ancient throne of Castile 
and Leon. The presidio was named *'The Royal 
Presidio," and was ever afterwards so called during 
Spain's dominion over California to distinguish it 
from the other presidios that were to be, and that 
were afterward established. And it was decided to 
call the church to be erected at the Mission, the 
"Royal Chapel," thus establishing Monterey as the 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 73 

civil, military and religious headquarters of the King- 
dom of Spain in California. 

Hoping and praying for the best at San Diego, 
Father Jimipero now started in with a will to build 
up the Mission San Carlos at Monterey. He built a 
chapel adjacent to the soldiers' quarters on perhaps 
the same spot where the stone church of San Carlos 
at Monterey now stands. Aroimd the church a pali- 
sade was erected. This done, he immediately set forth 
to realize the passion of his Life, which was to bring 
the heathen savage to the cross of Christ. 

Accompanied by Father Crespi, Serra visited the 
Indians in the surrounding neighborhood, offering 
them gifts and by other acts of kindness endeavor- 
ing to attract them to him. One of the Indian neo- 
phytes who had been brought from Lower California 
soon learned the dialect of the Monterey Indians and 
in that way Father Junipero was enabled to hold 
speech with them. Toward the end of December he 
was inexpressibly rejoiced to record the first baptism 
among the heathen and from that beginning his niun- 
ber of converts rapidly increased. The Indians often 
came to him in parties numbering a dozen or more 
to offer themselves for baptism. 

At the end of the second year it could be seen how 
splendidly Junipero Serra 's great dream was unfold- 
ing. Already the naked savages were clothed, they 
were learning to speak the Spanish tongue, to make 
the responses of the Mass in Latin, to sing and to 
play upon musical instruments and to work as arti- 
sans and husbandmen. In the lush harvest fields of 
Monterey their swinging scythes rang blithely ; upon 
the mountain side, in the dream-kissed valleys rose 
the song of the Indian herder as he guarded the 
magically increasing flocks. 

Before a year had passed, however. Father Juni- 
pero decided that it would be better from every point 



14: CALIFORNIA ; 

of view to find a more suitable location for his Mis- 
sion of San Carlos. In the first place, the opportu- 
nities for agricultural development on the immediate i 
shores of the Bay of Monterey were not sufficiently | 
large or promising for his purposes. But a more j 
important reason than this decided him to make the 
change, and this reason was that it was not good for 
his Indian neophytes to remain in such close con- j 
tact with Spanish soldiers who, like most of the Sons \ 
of Mars in the olden times, were not any too partic- \ 
ular concerning their own morals or the morals of I 
others. Father Jimipero found that his neophytes | 
were being corrupted and that unless something were j 
done they would f aU into a worse plight than that in ] 
which he had found them. Better, indeed, to have I 
left them in their nakedness, homeless and unchris- | 
tianized, subsisting as best they could on insects, j 
acorns, raw fish and such wild game as they could kill • , 
or trap with their bows and arrows, than to bring 
them into a state of civilization which could mean j 
for them only physical decay and the damnation of ; 
their redeemed souls. j 
Perhaps Junipero had still another reason for the j 
removal. He loved, intensely, the beautiful in nature, ' 
and there is no more beautiful spot in all God's green | 
world than the Valley of Carmelo. Yonder it lies i 
across the pine-clad hill five or six miles distant from | 
the crescent shores of the Bay of Monterey, that little i 
vale where Junipero Serra set up the throne of his j 
kingdom, which, like the Kingdom of his Master, was | 
not of this earth. Beautiful Carmelo, clasped so ten- j 
derly within the enfolding hiUs, the bright river j 
dancing down to the little bay, the sun kissing it with i 
a tireless and never faithless love — blessed and holy ] 
Carmelo, the Vallej^ of Junipero Serra 's heart — it is i 
worth a journey over all the oceans and all the lands ] 
on earth to see it. i 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 75 

As you cross the green hill that rolls back so gently 
from the shining waters and the clustering roofs of 
Monterey, you will pass through aisles of pine tuned 
to the music of soft sea winds, passing to and fro 
from either side. The wild deer will look at you, not 
askance but fearlessly there in the knowledge of his 
safety; the hush of the forest will soothe you as you 
journey— up hill half the way, then down hill for the 
other half. But you must not fall adream too cosily 
either as you walk or ride, for suddenly Carmelo wiU 
break upon the view, and you must not lose the first 
glimpse of it, lest it may chance that you shall not 
come again that way. You will see it, soft with the 
peace of God — Carmelo that was once so busy with 
the day's work, that was once so thronged with dusky 
faces, new-Lit with mystic joy — Carmelo that is so 
silent now, so lonely and so deserted, yet beautiful as 
at first. Like a pink cameo on the silken-green bosom 
of the vale, the mission church of Carmel stiU stands, 
towered and belfried, waiting in its entrancing yet 
pathetic loneliness for your welcome footsteps. You 
will be loath to come away — and you never can for- 
get. 

It was in the beginning of June, 1771, that Serra 
decided on the Valley of Carmelo as the new site of 
his Mission San Carlos. He immediately placed 
there some forty of his Lower California neophytes, 
three sailors and five soldiers, and gave the necessary 
directions for the hewing of timber and the erection 
of barracks. Also he gave directions that a wooden 
chapel, a storehouse and guardhouse, dwellings and 
corrals should be completed. Late in the following 
December the whole Mission establishment was trans- 
ferred from Monterey to Carmel. The Royal Chapel 
at Monterey was not, of course, abandoned, but was 
afterwards regularly served by the padres from 
Carmel. 



76 CALIFORNIA 

So eager was Serra to establish new Missions that 
he did not wait to see work begun at Carmelo. Once 
the plans for the new Mission were fully arranged, 
he set forth into the wilderness to found the third 
Mission, accompanied by two of his brother Francis- 
cans, some soldiers and with the necessary supplies. 
The party traveled south from Monterey along the 
Salinas River till they came at length, more than a 
distance of seventy-five miles, to a wondrously beau- 
tiful glen, studded with live oak trees. So entranc- 
ing was the spot that Father Junipero at once de- 
cided he would there build a Mission. The place 
was called Los Robles. 

There was not a single Indian in sight, nor were 
there any visible signs of the existence of a rancheria, 
as the Indian communities were termed, anywhere 
about. Yet, notwithstanding this, Junipero at once 
ordered the mules to be unloaded and, taking the 
bells which were carried along, he hung them to a 
branch of a tree and began vigorously to ring them, 
at the same time shouting in a sort of ecstatic frenzy : 
''O Gentiles, come, come, come to the holy church; 
come, come, come to receive the faith of Jesus 
Christ!" 

The brown-robed brothers at his side were aston- 
ished that Serra should put himself to what seemed 
to them to be much useless exertion, and they vigor- 
ously expostulated with him. "Why do you tire 
yourself ? ' ' they asked. ' ' This is not the place where 
the church is to be erected, nor are there any Indians 
here. It is useless to ring the bells. ' ' And Junipero 
answered them saying: ''Let me satisfy the long- 
ings of my heart, which desires that this bell might 
be heard over all the world, or that at least the Gen- 
tiles who dwell about these mountains may hear it." 
More to humor their superior than for any other 
reason, perhaps, the padres and the soldiers erected 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 77 

a large wooden cross and a cabin of green bows in 
which was built a rude altar. 

As it happened, a lone Indian who was straying 
in that direction and who was attracted by the ring- 
ing of the beUs, came up and looked wonderingly 
upon the strangers and the work in which they were 
engaged. Junipero joyfuUy approached the Indian, 
gave him presents and by means of signs caused him 
to understand that he wanted him to go and find his 
people and bring them back with him. This the as- 
tonished native did, in due time reappearing with 
large numbers of his tribe bearing an abimdance of 
seeds and nuts as presents to the missionaries. 

Thus was established the Mission of San Antonio 
de Padua, which now is seldom visited by anyone 
although what remains of it is still a ruin of great 
beauty. It lies far from the beaten track of travel 
and only those who are in love with beauty take the 
trouble to search it out. But in the days of the glory 
of the Missions San Antonio was in many respects 
the most famous of them all. The Indian neophytes 
there converted from heathenism to Christianity 
were more numerous than those of all the other Mis- 
sions combined, and it was there for many, many 
years that those wonderful horses were bred which 
have made California famous down to this day. 

Junipero Serra had now indeed become a busy 
man. He remained fifteen days at the new Mission 
of San Antonio and returned to his own Mission of 
San Carlos at Carmelo about August 1, 1771, with 
glowing accounts of his latest conquest which filled 
his missionary companions with joy. He at once 
sent word to Fathers Somera and Cambon to do as 
he himself had done, namely, to fare forth and estab- 
lish a new Mission which was to be called San Gabriel. 

In accordance with these instructions the two 
Franciscan Fathers named left San Diego with a 



78 CALIFORNIA 

guard of ten soldiers and marched steadily north- 
ward until they came to a great wide vaUey with a 
bright stream flowing through it. It was a valley 
that appeared to extend far eastward between the 
Sierra Madre mountains on the north and a chain of 
serranos on the south. On the eighth day of Sep- 
tember, 1771, the missionaries and soldiers halted at 
what appeared to them to be a most advantageous 
site for a Mission. The Indians who appeared for 
the purpose of watching their movements assumed 
a threatening attitude, but the padres under the pro- 
tection of the soldiers erected a large wooden cross, 
sprinkled the ground with holy water and chanted the 
hymns usual to such occasions. The attitude of the 
Indians constantly grew more threatening, resolving 
itself, at length, into palpable preparation for a war- 
like attack. The little party of Spaniards was dis- 
mayed and probably would have suffered annihila- 
tion had it not been for a happy thought on the part 
of the missionaries. They carried with them a large 
banner upon which was emblazoned a picture of the 
Virgin and which they suddenly unfurled to the as- 
tonished vision of the savages. The effect was in- 
stantaneous. The Indians threw down their arms 
and came forward with every indication of submis- 
sion, prostrating themselves at the feet of the padres. 
It was in this manner that the Mission San Gabriel 
was founded. It came, in time, to be an establish- 
ment so great and so vast that it was often called 
"The Queen of the Missions." It gathered into its 
fold thousands of neophytes, its flocks and herds were 
thick in the deep, fertile vaUey and upon the hill- 
sides. Its graneries were never empty. Much good 
wine was made there during its many years of happy 
existence. Its Indian artizans became so skilful that 
they once built a ship which was launched in the har- 
bor of San Pedro. In the tumble and wreck and 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 79 

ruin of the sad days which followed secularization, 
the church building at San Gabriel withstood the 
ravages of decay and it is still in a very good state of 
preservation. It was from this Mission that Felipe 
de Neve, accompanied by the Fathers of the Mission, 
a goodly company of soldiers, pablodores and In- 
dians, marched westward a distance of eight miles 
towards the sea and, amid religious ceremonies and 
the thunder of artillery, founded the present city of 
Los Angeles. The date was September, 1781, and 
Felipe de Neve was then Governor of California. 

The next or fifth Mission to be established was 
that of San Luis Obispo. It was founded by Father 
Serra in person. The date was September 1, 1772. 
The occasion was made a part of The Father Presi- 
dent's first official journey southward from his own 
Mission of San Carlos at Carmelo to San Diego. The 
fact that by this time five Missions had been founded 
and established in the short space of three years, 
gives eloquent proof of the restless and indefatigable 
energy of Junipero Serra. The battle-line of Christ 
was already far-flung in the new land. 

On this journey, as indeed on all his journeys dur- 
ing his life in California, Father Junipero went 
afoot. How many times he walked all the way from 
Monterey to San Francisco, then down to San Diego 
and back again, it were difficult to say. And the old 
cruel wound in his leg that he received in the Sierra 
Gorda grew never better, but always a little worse, 
thus adding to his physical sufferings a torture which 
few men would have been able to withstand. 

The founding of Mission San Luis Obispo was 
conducted with the usual ceremonies. Although 
Father Junipero remained there one day only on this 
occasion, he wrote that he had great hopes for the 
success of the new establishment. "Let us leave time 
to tell the story of the progress which Christianity 



80 CALIFORNIA 

wiU make among these Gentiles," he said, ''in spite 
of the Enemy who has already begun to lash his tail 
by means of bad soldiers." We see that the good 
padres had already begun to have their griefs. San 
Luis Obispo grew to be a fairly successful estab- 
lishment and it is said that the curved, red roof -tiles, 
so familiar in California, were first manufactured at 
this Mission. 

Toward the end of the year 1774 the Spanish Vice- 
roy in Mexico notified Father Junipero and Capt. 
Rivera y Moncada that he intended to establish a 
new presidio at San Francisco, simultaneously with 
which Serra was requested to begin his contemplated 
Mission at that point in order that it might serve as 
a base of operations for the extension of Spanish and 
Christian power. Father Junipero selected Fathers 
Cambon and Palou to accompany the soldiers and 
f oimd the Mission at the same time that the presidio 
was to be founded by the military. Lieut. Juan de 
Ayala was ordered to proceed from Monterey with 
the ship he commanded and explore the waters in 
the region of San Francisco bay. 

The establishment of the new presidio at San Fran- 
cisco was placed in the hands of Juan de Anza, the 
famous captain of Tubac, who had then successfully 
completed his march from Sonora in Mexico, over- 
land to Monterey — the first man to blaze the inland 
trail. Anza selected the site for the new presidio 
where it still stands after having passed under the 
domination of four distinct successive governments 
— Spain, Mexico, The Bear Flag Republic and the 
United States. 

Then came the first sailor who ever steered his ship 
through the Golden Gate. He was Juan de Ayala, 
Lieutenant of the Royal Navy of Spain, and his ship 
was the San Carlos — the same sturdy vessel that 
brought the first pioneers to San Diego when Cali- 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 81 

f ornia began. It was on the night of August 5, 1775, 
that the San Carlos struck in from sea and won the 
harbor of St. Francis — the first sail that ever entered 
there. Buoyant as a white gull from the wastes of 
the wild waters, leaping on the tides that ran as a 
mill-race between the broken headlands of Lobos and 
Benita, soft and silent under the stars, sailed the San 
Carlos that night, and Juan de Ayala, with soul 
athrill, upon her deck. At morn she lay with folded 
sails in the quiet harbor, with supplies for the new 
Mission and presidio, seed for the harvests that 
were to be, neophytes and artisans to break the wait- 
ing loam and erect the buildings, soldiers in whose 
keeping was the honor of Spain; and last, but not 
least, the good padre, Vicente de Santa Maria, to 
bless it all. 

* ' If St. Francis desires a Mission, let him show us 
his harbor," Don Jose Galvez had said to Junipero 
Serra at La Paz when the conquest of California was 
being planned. Here was the harbor and a Spanish 
ship riding at anchor between its brown hills, and 
on shore was already risen the wooden cross of the 
new Mission of St. Francis. 

Junipero Serra did not see the new Mission at 
San Francisco until October, 1777, at which time he 
also first saw the great harbor which he had named. 
As he stood gazing upon that wonderful inland sea 
he exclaimed, with deep emotion: '* Thanks be to 
God that now our Father St. Francis, with the Holy 
Cross of the procession of Missions, has reached the 
farthest boundary of the California continent. To 
go farther he must have boats. ' ' 

The church building which was in due time erected 
has well withstood all the buffets of time and is still 
standing in good condition. It was left unharmed 
by the great earthquake of 1906 and escaped the con- 
flagration which accompanied that awful cataclysm, 



82 CALIFORNIA 

although aU the buildings around it were utterly 
destroyed. 

In August of 1775, the Father President was 
able to rejoice in the success of six flourishing mis- 
sionary establishments. At a conference of the 
Fathers in charge of these institutions, held at Mon- 
terey, the founding of a new Mission to be known 
as San Juan Capistrano, some seventy-five miles 
north of San Diego, was decided upon. Accordingly 
this Mission was begun on October 30, following, with 
Father Lasuen officiating. The dedication ceremo- 
nies took place the following day, namely, November 
1, 1776. 

San Juan Capistrano was very successful from the 
first hour of its existence. The Indians were kindly 
disposed from the start. They readily accepted the 
Christian faith and, as time passed, they became in- 
dustrious agriculturists and herdsmen and noted as 
artisans. The stone church which was later erected 
at this Mission was in its time the finest and hand- 
somest church edifice in all California. It is said 
that fourteen years were consumed in its construc- 
tion, the Indian neophytes quarrying the stone from 
the adjacent hiUs and freighting it down to the mis- 
sion with infinite patience and labor. They builded 
the church, stone upon stone, with their own hands, 
an indisputable proof of the high state of manual 
skill and civilization to which the most degraded and 
least hopeful race of savages on the face of the earth 
was lifted by the patient love and tireless teaching 
of the Franciscan padres. The beautiful church was 
ruined by an earthquake in 1812 on a Simday morn- 
ing, resulting in the death of forty persons, mostly 
Indian neophytes who were in attendance upon divine 
service. The glory of San Juan Capistrano has 
passed even as the beauty of the dream which called 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 83 

it forth, but what still remains of it stands as the 
most entrancing ruin on the American continent. 

Santa Clara was the eighth Mission to be founded. 
In the original arrangement it was intended to found 
this Mission at the time of the foundation of the San 
Francisco Mission, but a delay was occasioned be- 
cause of the jealousy that was then rampant in mili- 
tary circles. Consequently, the foundation of Santa 
Clara did not take place until January 12, 1777. It 
was conducted by Padre Tomas de la Pena Saradia, 
under the direction of Father Junipero, the Father 
President, who was then at his own Mission of San 
Carlos at Carmelo. 

The history of the Mission Santa Clara is splen- 
did with achievements and glamorous with romance. 
It still remains a highly successful institution al- 
though its physical outlines are greatly changed from 
the original, owing to many repairs and alterations. 
The original church building, however, remains quite 
intact and a cross that was reared on the day the 
Mission was founded is still standing. But the Fran- 
ciscans are no longer there. In their place are the 
Jesuits, their ancient rivals, from whom, as it was 
ordained, the Franciscans snatched the glory of chris- 
tianizing California. Standing in the heart of the 
deep lush Valley of Santa Clara, the old Mission re- 
mains a busy place. From its ancient walls issue, 
year by year, throngs of eager students whom the 
Jesuits train for the work of the world. If Junipero 
Serra could come back to earth he might regret that 
his own brown-robed brethren have been supplanted 
in a well-loved spot, but he would see much else that 
would satisfy him. He would not look upon ruin and 
desolation such as would sadden his vision at San 
Diego, Capistrano, and many other places sacred to 
memory and very dear to him in the days of his labor 
on earth. But, instead, he would behold life and 



84 CALIFORNIA 

energy and power, and that industry in both worldly 
and spiritual affairs which he taught and which he 
exemplified in his own restless, indomitable and self- 
sacrificing career. And he would see inclosing the 
ancient church from whose altars he preached, not 
the adobe walls upreared by his neophytes, but the 
clustering rooftrees, the long, shaded streets and the 
gardens of Santa Clara town, thick with roses the 
whole year round. 

It will be remembered that the instructions of Don 
Jose Galvez to the expedition of 1769 that left La 
Paz, were that after a Mission had been built at San 
Diego and a second at Monterey, the third was to be 
built at a place between which was to be called San 
Buenaventura, but it transpired that San Buenaven- 
tura was not the third but the ninth Mission to be 
founded. Busy though he was with other trying 
affairs at the time, and also much worn by his ever 
increasing labors and old age. Father Junipero 
walked down to San Gabriel from his own Mission 
at Carmel and, meeting there Padre Cambon and 
Governor Felipe de Neve, they all set out for the 
Santa Barbara channel with the usual company of 
soldiers and neophytes, founding on Easter Sunday, 
March 31, 1783, Mission San Buenaventura. The 
Mission waxed fat from a material point of view, at 
one time standing at the head of the list in the num- 
ber of head of cattle owned. It also flourished from 
a spiritual aspect, but when it began to decay its 
decline was very rapid. Its old church is among the 
best preserved of Mission structures and is a familiar 
sight along the old King's Highway, now busy with 
the traffic of modern times. 

The famous Mission of Santa Barbara, the next to 
be established, was inevitable not only because of the 
luring splendor of the spot, its physical charm and 
sheltered location, but more so because it was densely 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 85 

populated with Indians. Above all things it was the 
Indians whom the padres sought— the heathen Gen- 
tiles whom they so eagerly desired to bring into the 
fold of Christianity. Moreover, the Santa Barbara 
Indians and all the so-called Channel Indians were 
the superiors in strength and intelligence of any of 
the aborigines of California whom the Spaniards had 
yet seen. 

As soon as the Mission San Buenaventura had been 
established, Junipero Serra and Governor Felipe de 
Neve moved up to the point now known as Santa Bar- 
bara for the purpose of founding a Mission there. 
But it was a presidio only that was founded upon 
this occasion. The military had already grown jeal- 
ous of the ever growing power and wealth of the 
Missions under Father Junipero 's masterly guid- 
ance and direction. For one reason or another Gov- 
ernor de Neve made excuses for delay and finally 
Father Junipero left him to erect a garrison, although 
a cross was reared and a site selected for a Mission. 
Four years afterward, on December 4, 1786 — two 
years after Father Junipero 's death — his successor, 
Fermin Francisco de Lasuen, founded the Mission 
Santa Barbara with a Mass, the singing of the Veni 
Creator and the pomp and splendor of the Roman 
liturgy. 

When fell upon Junipero Serra 's great dream, 
long after his death, the wreck and ruin of evil days 
and El Camino Real was strewn, not with prosperous 
Mission hospices but with their fallen and silent roofs 
and towers, and the brown-robed Franciscans and 
their happy neophytes were hunted back to the wil- 
derness to starve and die, this Mission of Santa Bar- 
bara was the one grey fortress that never surren- 
dered. Within its quiet walls the Franciscans held 
their ground. At times their numbers dwindled to a 
mere handful — often no more than two of the breth- 



86 CALIFORNIA 

ren were left to keep alive the altar lights — but they 
never wholly departed. 

In consequence of the fact that in California the 
Franciscans, for many years, could be found only at 
Santa Barbara, there arose a popular belief that the 
forbidden garden of this Mission was an institution 
peculiar to itself. Hence, the famous ' ' Sacred Gar- 
den of Santa Barbara," into which women are not 
allowed to enter. The truth is, however, that there 
was at every Mission a garden of this character, as 
there always is and always was in connection with 
every Franciscan community. 

During the two years following the founding of 
the Mission San Buenaventura and the selection of a 
site for a Mission at Santa Barbara, no new Missions 
were built during the life of Father Junipero Serra. 
The time was spent by him in ceaseless labor for the 
upbuilding of the Missions already established, but 
the days of his labors were now about to close. He 
had been given authority by Rome to confer the rite 
of confirmation in order to meet the demands of the 
work which he was directing for the Church, but he 
had never been consecrated to the office of Bishop. 
Therefore, for the purpose of confirming the neo- 
phytes who had been baptized and also for the pur- 
pose of directing the work of the Missions in person, 
he seems to have been almost continuously traveling 
up and down the length of California from San Fran- 
cisco to San Diego. These journeys were made in- 
variably on foot, and his bed at night was never any 
other than the bare ground. When at his own Mis- 
sion of San Carlos or at any of the other Mission 
establishments which he founded, he slept always on 
a bare bench with neither cushion nor mattress to 
soften the asperities of so inhospitable a bed. He ate 
sparingly at all times of the commonest and poorest 
food. He drank no wine. When preaching he was 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 87 

wont to throw himself into a religious frenzy during 
which he would mercilessly flay his bare shoulders 
with a whip and cruelly strike his bare breast with a 
stone. These fearful hardships to which he subjected 
himself were enough to have killed ten strong men 
before the time that they brought at last this marvel- 
ous and heroic old pioneer and proselytizer to the 
verge of his waiting grave. 

On the twenty-eighth of August, 1784, at the age 
of seventy years, nine months and twenty-one days, 
Junipero Serra went to his everlasting rest at his 
own Mission of San Carlos in his loved valley of 
Carmelo, a little before two o'clock in the afternoon. 
For almost fifty-four years he had been a Franciscan 
priest, thirty-five years of which had been spent in 
missionary labors. 

During the sixteen years of Junipero 's labors in 
California, nine Missions had been established, either 
directly by himself or under his direction. In those 
Missions were five thousand eight hundred Indian 
neophytes whom he had converted, with the assistance 
of his companions, from heathenism to Christianity. 
This number of people whom he had found living 
worse than the lives of dogs he left in a new world of 
light and health and joy. He had taught the hand of 
the savage to do a Christian white man's work, to 
sing Christian music and speak prayers. Within 
the valleys and the sun-swept hills where he had 
found only waste and desolation he left unnumbered 
flocks and herds. It is, perhaps, quite safe to say 
that there is not in all the history of civilization one 
other single man whose individual labors for God and 
humanity bore such a bountiful harvest. The name 
of Junipero Serra is today the best loved name in 
California, without distinction of class or creed. His 
memory is honored and revered by all the people. 

The day he died the guns on the ships in the harbor 



88 CALIFORNIA 

of Monterey boomed in solemn salute as though a 
Prince of the Realm had gone to rest. Yet this 
tribute was slight compared with the tears and lamen- 
tations that fell upon Carmelo when Father Junipero 
was no more. The Indians in their frantic grief 
fought for the shreds of his poor brown robe and for 
the white locks of his hair. His sandals were borne 
away by the officers of the Royal Navy to be kept 
with them at sea, against storm and danger. Never 
looked the sky so fair over Carmelo again; never 
sang the bright river so gladly any more. 

He passed, his labors and his sufferings ended, to 
be at last quite forgotten, his very grave neglected 
and covered with debris in the sad years that came 
to undo the work of his great heart and his tireless 
hand. But when the vandal years had had their fling, 
Time again bethought itself of that holy dust lying 
within the broken Mission walls in the silent vale. 
After he had lain a century and a quarter dead, his 
fame leaped up again like a sudden flame from aban- 
doned embers. And Junipero Serra came then again 
to his own. Today, as it shall be throughout all the 
days to come, the tramp of many feet go to seek him 
in his quiet grave. 

The progress of the Missions did not end with the 
death of Serra. On the contrary, their glory had 
just then begun. The religious and material pros- 
perity which then ensued stands now as one of the 
brightest memories in the history of human achieve- 
ments. Immediately after Junipero 's death the in- 
crease in the Missions ' flocks and herds and the harv- 
ests of the fields, as well as the astounding increase in 
the number of Indian converts, was doubtless due to 
the impetus which the Founder and first Father 
President had given to the work. His Franciscan 
associates and successors, however, piously declared 
that the great success which then came about was due 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 89 

to Father Junipero's intercession at the Great White 
Throne in the other world, to which he had departed, 
for the last promise he made on earth was that he 
would plead for the success of the Missions when he 
came face to face with his Creator. 

For a very brief period Father Palou, Junipero 
Serra 's old friend and his illustrious biographer, suc- 
ceeded him in the Presidency of the Missions, but 
in a few months Father Palou retired to the College 
of San Fernando in Mexico to reap the reward of a 
well-earned rest and to devote himself to his writ- 
ings. Father Fermin Francisco de Lasuen was then 
appointed Father President of the California Mis- 
sions. 

Lasuen was a man of great ability, tireless energy 
and holy life. He proved to be a successor who en- 
deavored in every possible way to be worthy of the 
great honor and trust which were imposed upon him. 
He at once began the erection of new Missions and 
put forth all his fine energies for the increase of the 
old establishments. 

Leaving the presidio at Santa Barbara and travel- 
ing back into the mountain valleys to where the pres- 
ent town of Lompoc is situated. Father Lasuen, with 
the usual ceremonies and surrounded by the usual 
company, founded the Mission La Purisima Concep- 
cion on December 8, 1787. Missionaries were placed 
in charge, as was the case with all these foundations, 
and to them were delegated the work and the respon- 
sibility of making the establishment successful. La 
Purisima became indeed highly successful with a 
proud record of baptisms, bounteous harvests and 
large flocks. 

In 1789 two additional Missions were decided upon, 
the first to be named in honor of The Holy Cross. 
This was the Mission popularly known as Santa Cruz, 
located where now stands the beautiful city of that 



90 CALIFORNIA 

name. Not a trace of the Mission now remains. 
Owing to the many unfortunate obstacles which 
rose and to much sickness and other species of ill 
luck, Santa Cruz became nothing more than a fairly 
successful Mission. The date of its founding was 
December 25, 1791. 

In the October preceding, the other Mission which 
had been decided upon was successfully founded. It 
was named in honor of Our Lady of Solitude, and 
is now commonly known as " La Soledad. " It is now, 
as it has ever been, a lonely spot. It was at this Mis- 
sion when, in the wake of secularization, the days of 
evil came to scatter the flocks of the fold that Father 
Sarria, who devotedly remained at his post, though 
broken down by years and exhausted by hunger, died 
on the steps of the altar of the church from sheer 
starvation one Sunday morning as he was about to 
celebrate Mass in the presence of a little handful of 
Christian Indians who alone were left of all the great 
throngs that once were wont to assemble there. 

Father Lasuen now determined that the time had 
come to found a Mission in honor of St. Joseph, the 
patron saint of California. Consequently, on June 
11, 1797, the Mission San Jose de Guadelupe was 
founded among the brown foothills, in a place of run- 
ning streams, opposite Mission Santa Clara, a dis- 
tance of some twenty miles, on the northerly side of 
the Santa Clara Valley. Thus that famous Valley 
was distinguished in the possession of two Missions. 
Mission San Jose was, in its time, very prosperous, 
though now only a trace of the buildings remains. In 
these times it is often visited because of the natural 
beauty of the spot and, of course, for the sake of the 
sacred and romantic memories which have their habi- 
tation there, and also because of the wonderful marble 
tombs still to be seen in the quaint cemetery of the 
old Mission patio, which were carved in Italy and 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 91 

brought to California to adorn the sepulchers of rich 
old Spanish and Mexican overlords who once dwelt 
there in power and luxury. 

The delightful and picturesque little valley of San 
Benito with its fertile fields and great abundance of 
water next attracted the attention of the missionary 
and civil authorities who decided that a new Mission 
should be built there to administer to the spiritual 
wants and physical needs of its numerous Indian in- 
habitants. This Mission was, accordingly, founded 
and was named San Juan Bautista in honor of St. 
John the Baptist. The date was June 24, 1797. This 
Mission, the buildings of which have splendidly with- 
stood the onslaughts of time, is located in the quaint 
and historic old village of San Juan only a few miles 
distant from the thriving and modern city of Hollis- 
ter. San Juan Bautista had a long and prosperous 
career. 

The sixteenth Mission to be established was named 
in honor of Michael, The Archangel, and is known 
as Mission San Miguel. It is located in the city of 
that name. In order to realize the spiritual and 
romantic atmosphere as well as to be informed as to 
the method of procedure at the foundation of a new 
Mission, Father Lasuen's account of the beginning 
of San Miguel will prove interesting. "Here," he 
says, ''on July 25, 1797, with the assistance of Father 
Buenaventura Sit jar, and of the troops destined to 
guard the new establishment, in the presence of a 
great multitude of Gentiles of both sexes and of all 
ages, whose pleasure and rejoicing exceeded even our 
expectation, thanks be to God, I blessed the water 
and the place, and a great cross which we venerated 
and raised. Immediately I intoned the Litany of 
the Saints and after it sang the Mass, during which I 
preached, and we concluded the ceremonies by sol- 
emnly singing the Te Deum. May it all be for the 



92 CALIFORNIA 

greater honor and glory of God, Our Lord. Amen. ' ' 
By the simimer of 1797, while the military and civil 
authorities of California were busily engaged in in- 
trenching the Spanish power by the establishment of 
pueblos, the Padres were even more busily engaged 
in filling up the gaps in Junipero's far-flung line of 
religious establishments by the erection of new Mis- 
sion hospices. 

On September 8, 1797, Lasuen came down from 
Santa Barbara and founded the Mission San Fer- 
nando Key de Espana, the ruins of which still remain, 
a distance of twenty-two miles from the city of Los 
Angeles. Father Francisco Dumetz, who was des- 
tined to become the last survivor of the immortal 
band of Franciscans who came to California with 
Junipero Serra, was present and took part in the 
ceremonies at the founding of this Mission. Like its 
near neighbor, San Gabriel, the Mission San Fer- 
nando became a very prosperous establishment both 
from a material and spiritual point of view. 

One month following the founding of San Fer- 
nando another important step toward the closing of 
the gap was taken by the establishment of the famous 
Mission San Luis Rey de Francia. Although it was 
upon the date mentioned that this Mission was de- 
cided upon, it seems that its erection was not really 
begun until June of 1798. San Luis Rey began very 
auspiciously, fifty-four Indian children having been 
baptized on the spot the day of its foundation. The 
church that was later built was wonderfully spared 
from the vandalism of time and in the later days of 
the nineteenth century experienced a thrilling resto- 
ration. After long years of loneliness and isolation, 
the brown-robed Franciscans came back to San Luis 
Rey, repaired its fallen roofs, set up anew its waver- 
ing walls and once again rang the music of the ancient 
Mission bells across the dreaming valley and up into 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 93 

the silent hills. In answer to that melodious call, 
the remnant of the once happy community of neo- 
phytes, tottering old Indian men and women with 
their children and their children's children, came 
flocking back to San Luis Eey to hear again the 
Padres ' voices and the well-loved music of the Mass, 
their hearts filled with gladness beyond the power 
of words to tell. Here also at San Luis Rey was 
planted the original California pepper tree in the 
patio of the Mission where Father Antonio Peyri 
placed it in the loving soil with his own gentle hands. 

The next Mission to be built, the nineteenth in 
chronological order, was not founded until September 
17, 1804. This was the Mission Santa Ynez, beauti- 
fully located in the mountains seventy miles distant 
from San Luis Obispo. It came to be a prosperous 
place despite earthquakes and Indian attacks which 
for some years placed great obstacles in the way of its 
progress. It was at this Mission that Father Arroyo 
resided for some years. He was in many respects a 
remarkable man, and was noted as a scholar. He 
was especially skilful in languages and, during his 
labors at Santa Ynez and other Missions, prepared 
a working grammar of the language of the Indians of 
the whole San Juan region. What remained of the 
buildings of the Mission, after the many years of 
decay that followed secularization, have lately been 
restored. 

Not a trace now remains of San Rafael, which was 
really a branch of the Mission at San Francisco, its 
situation having been a distance of perhaps not more 
than eighteen miles northward. During the compara- 
tively short period of its existence San Rafael made a 
fine record, particularly in regard to conversions. 
The date of its foundation was December, 1817. 

The twenty-first and last of the Franciscan Mis- 
sions in California was established within the limits 



94 CALIFORNIA 

of what is now the city of Sonoma, about forty-five 
miles north of San Francisco. It was named in 
honor of St. Francis of Solano. This was in 1823 
and the ceremonies of foundation took place in the 
presence of a number of Russians who had by this 
time made their appearance on the North Pacific 
Coast — their presence a testimony to the fact that 
Latin power in this quarter of the world was already 
on the wane. But the Russians at Sonoma were very 
friendly to the missionaries and donated a number 
of useful and ornamental articles to the new Mission. 

In the crazy-mad hurry and scurry of today it 
will ease the heart a bit and soothe a jangled nerve to 
open the dusty doorways of the past and look in on 
those who lived and toiled and had their being in the 
old Missions of California before the day of evil 
befell them. 

At 5 o 'clock in the morning the Mission was astir. 
The brown priests rose quickly, slipped their feet 
into their sandals and hastened to the chapel to say 
Mass. The corporal and his six soldiers — a mighty 
military establishment, that — tmnbled out of their 
quarters, grudgingly, perhaps, after the manner of 
rough men of war. They, too, must join in the 
prayers. Then, from within and without the great, 
gray adobe walls, the neophytes, men, women, chil- 
dren and all, came to kneel and ask God 's blessing on 
the new day. After the Mass, the monks retired to 
the dining-room to partake, standing and in silence, 
of their breakfast of bread and coffee. 

Now everybody, brown priests and all, turn to the 
day's busy task, some to the wide, far-flung fields, 
others to shop and mill, and others still to tend the 
herds and flocks. There was the sound of anvils ring- 
ing and the quaint chant of harvest songs from the 
fields. The women were at the looms or sewing. At 
eleven o 'clock the bells summoned the workers to their 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 95 

midday meal, which consisted of simple but whole- 
some fare. Looking in where the Franciscans are 
dining, we find one of their nmnber reading to the 
others from some pious book. After the meal there 
were prayers again in the chapel and the recitation 
of a psalm ; then an hour or so for recreation or siesta. 
The afternoon was spent in toil again until six o 'clock, 
which was the supper hour. This meal concluded, 
there was recreation once more for all but the monks, 
who had still their tasks of teaching Spanish, music 
and Christian doctrine to those who were fitted for 
or in need of such instructions. At nine o'clock the 
day was done — a day spent in prayer and toil — the 
stars gleamed above the Mission towers, enfolding it 
and its happy people in peace and dreams. 

This was the usual daily routine, but life at the 
Mission was not permitted to become monotonous. 
There were great feast days — many of them, indeed 
— when the whole community gave itself over to some 
religious celebration, followed by play and sport, 
horse-racing, feats of strength and endurance, games 
and every kind of innocent pleasure. 

The result of this system on the Indians was little 
short of marvelous. From degraded ' ' diggers ' ' with- 
out law or morals to guide them, they grew into the 
stature of civilized beings. There is little foundation 
for the idiotic and far-fetched lie that the Franciscans 
treated the Indians cruelly,or even with harshness ex- 
cept in rare instances. There was a strict discipline, 
to be sure, and punishment for crimes and misde- 
meanors. But equal justice was meted out to all. 
There was an occasion on which it was shown that a 
corporal at San Gabriel was guilty of lewd and im- 
moral actions with the Indian women. When Fath- 
er Serra came on the next visit he had the corporal 
lashed and driven from the place. 

In proof of the love the Indian neophytes bore 



96 CALIFORNIA 

their brown-robed teachers and guardians, history re- 
cords many striking incidents. Whenever a padre 
for any reason departed from a mission establish- 
ment it was always a cause for deep grief among the 
neophytes. Once when a specially beloved padre was 
leaving California to return to Mexico, the Indians 
followed him down to the shore in great throngs weep- 
ing and wailing, several of them swimming out to the 
ship in the harbor, boarding its decks and refusing to 
return. Nothing could be done except to carry them 
away. 

In the days when the prosperity of the Missions 
was at its height, Junipero Serra's dream had, in- 
deed, reached splendid proportions. Within the shel- 
tering walls of those vast establishments there were as 
many as thirty thousandChristianized Indians at one 
time, leading not only wholesome Christian lives, but 
following, as well, all the occupations of artisans 
known to those days. It is asserted that fully fifty 
distinct trades and crafts were taught the Indians by 
the Franciscan Fathers. Besides this, the Missions 
farmed vast areas of land and were in possession of 
thousand upon thousand of heads of sheep and cattle. 
They also had come to have a large and profitable 
commerce with Yankee and foreign ships in hides, 
tallow, wine and other products, as well as manufac- 
tured articles. 

Now comes the question : Why did this seven-hun- 
dred-mile chain of producing establishments fail and 
how has it come to pass that they now lie wasted and 
broken and ruined on The King's Highway, their 
greatness and their glory departed ? 

History itself furnishes the answer, and it is this : 
The Spanish Crown and, later, the Mexican Govern- 
ment, which succeeded the Spanish Crown, had suc- 
cessivel}^ on their hands military establishments in 
California which subsisted on the industry of the 



THE STORY OF THE MISSIONS 97 

Missions. The soldiers did not work, but had to be 
fed just the same. Both Spain and Mexico, in the 
course of time, came to owe the Missions a great deal 
of money for the food and supplies which were fur- 
nished to the various presidios and garrisons. Look- 
ing the matter over coolly and calculatingly, after the 
manner of thrones and nations in the pains of a pov- 
erty resulting from criminal waste and extravagance, 
they decided that it would be much easier to boldly 
cord&scate the Mission establishments, with all their 
fruitful fields, orchards, flocks and herds, than to pay 
the debts they owed them. 

Wherefore, as early as 1813, the Spanish Cortes 
passed a decree secularizing — which was to say, con- 
fiscating — the California Missions and all other Mis- 
sions in Spanish America. Thus was the robbery 
— for it was nothing less — inaugurated, and although 
Spain never got around to the point of carrying out 
the scheme, the Mexican Republic, which succeeded 
Spain in California, took up the idea with enthusi- 
asm and pushed it through to its sad and squalid 
finish. One after another the great, splendid hos- 
pices were sold at auction to greedy buyers. As an 
instance of the way these things were done, it is 
necessary only to state that the beautiful Mission 
San Juan Capistrano was disposed of to a purchaser 
for the ridiculous sum of seven hundred dollars. 

It was not the Franciscans who were robbed but 
the Indians. It was the Indians who owned the 
Missions. A Franciscan never owned anything, not 
even laying claim to the sandals on his feet or the 
rough brown robe on his back. They simply acted 
as trustees for the native people whom they had re- 
deemed through infinite suffering and sacrifice from 
savagery and heathenism. 

Thus, by the time the United States came into pos- 
session of California in 1848, the Franciscan MLs- 



98 CALIFORNIA 

sions begun by Junipero Serra in 1769 had passed 
into history. They were no more. The great high- 
way which bound these establishments together was 
called El Camino Real, The Royal Road — The King's 
Highway. Each Mission was situated a day's jour- 
ney on foot, the one apart from the other. Their 
doors were always open in welcome and shelter to 
the wandering wayfarer, whoever he might be. The 
plenty that was there was for whoever might come to 
partake of it. Now the hospice roofs have fallen in 
the dust, the Mission bells are silent, and from fertile 
field and peaceful patio the dusky faces once throng- 
ing there have departed. 

Very many writers who have put forth what they 
wrote as historical records, and many other less 
ostentatious writers who have written on the subject 
of the California Missions, have invariably concluded 
their chronicles with the statement that the labors 
of Junipero Serra and his brown-robed successors in 
the work of the Missions ended in failure. They say 
it was a dream that had no realization. 

But they miss the point. The material aspect of 
the Missions was merely subsidiary and auxiliary 
to their spiritual aspect. What Junipero Serra came 
to California to do was to Christianize the Indians. 
To feed and clothe them and to teach them trades 
were secondary considerations, which, in the wisdom 
of Serra and his associates and successors, were re- 
garded as a necessary service to perform. But the 
dream was, first and foremost and above all things, to 
convert the heathen to Christianity. The Indians and 
their descendants lost the land and the Mission estab- 
lishments which the Franciscans taught them to till 
and to build, but they have never lost the religion 
which the padres brought them. Their descendants 
have it to this day. Wherefore, the dream of Juni- 
pero Serra is a dream come true. 



IV 

MONTEREY THE FIRST CAPITAL 

Monterey is the dream that came true; the lost 
place that was found — the place that was and that is 
again to be. It was once the port o 'ships, the trader's 
mecca, the pilgrim's shrine, the wanderer's lode- 
stone. Wealth decked it with jewels, fashion plumed 
it with gay feathers. It rose, as in a day, from sav- 
age squalor to voluptuous civilization. From its 
pine-clad hills was swung the star of a new empire ; 
in its valleys of oak and from its shores of cypress 
were chanted the Te Deums of destiny. Its name 
was strimg in litanies at the foot of Christ's cross and 
rung to the music of battles from clashing swords. 
But there came a day when the head that wore a 
crown was in the dust, when rags alone were left of 
much purple and fine linen ; when all that remained 
of Monterey was memory and that wondrous beauty 
which was the gift of God and which only the hand 
of God can take away. 

In no other place of all the world was history made 
with a rapidity more amazing. Under the sun- 
glinted waters of the Bay of Monterey and in the 
bosom of the serranos which close it in is buried a 
past as romantic as that which is whispered by the 
dead leaves of Vallambrosa, stirred by the winds of 
summer when the moon is low. Into three-quarters 
of a century of life and mastery it crowded the his- 
tory of an age. But its glory did not pass to come 
no more. 

Long before the Anglo-Saxon reared his first roof- 
tree on the bleak shores of the Atlantic in the New 

..E .. 



100 CALIFORNIA 

World, Monterey watched the white man's buffeted 
sail and felt the touch of his hand. Cabrillo steered 
his prows against her guardian headlands, fighting 
his way against wind and wave to Mendocino in 1542, 
that time he doubled back to die on San Miguel amid 
the isles of Santa Barbara. In 1602 Sebastian Viz- 
caino anchored his ships in the harbor, naming 
it in honor of his patron, Gaspar de Zuniga, Compt de 
Monterey, then the viceroy of Mexico. Under an oak 
tree that stood at the head of a little cove in the bay, 
the priests of Vizcaino's expedition reared a cross 
and sang the Mass, then sailed away, leaving the spot 
to its ancient silences. For one hundred sixty-six 
years the foot of no civilized man came again to 
Monterey. 

But from the hour that Vizcaino returned to Mex- 
ico with the report of his voyages, Monterey fastened 
itself upon the imagination of New Spain and of old 
Spain as well. It became the ultima thule of the 
Conquistadore's dreams. The mind made pictures 
of the noble harbor set deep within the swinging hills, 
the Sim dancing upon its waters, and the green of 
wild pastures, lush and lovely, closing it in. They 
thought the fabled Seven Cities must lie near it and 
that it would lead them to the towers of gold, the 
lure of which haunted the broken heart of the grim 
conqueror, Cortes himself, to the last breath of life 
that warmed him. Yet the years passed — a century 
and near another — before there came again a sail to 
Monterey. Then, in 1769, the expedition that had set 
out from La Paz under the authority of Galvez, the 
Visitador-General of Mexico, landed at San Diego 
and took possession of California in the name of the 
King of Spain. But the expedition had hardly reared 
the Cross at San Diego before the search for storied 
Monterey began. And a weary search it was, beating 



MONTEREY THE FIRST CAPITAL 101 

its often hopeless trails and pathways over both land 
and sea. 

At last, however, on May 31, 1770, the good ship 
San Antonio, commanded by Capt. Juan Perez, 
anchored in the bright harbor. The lost was found 
again ; the weary quest was at an end, and, from that 
hour, Monterey was destined to take her place among 
the civilized communities of the world. Word of the 
great and long-looked-for success was at once for- 
warded to the City of Mexico, where the joy of the 
authorities and the people was boundless. From lip 
to lip throughout the streets of the capital sped the 
great news. ** Monterey has been found; the flag of 
the King is fljdng over it, ' ' rang forth the wild cry of 
victory and exultation. The news did not reach the 
capital of Mexico until August, but that was quick 
work for those days when even the telegraph had not 
yet been dreamed of. It was indeed a glad day. The 
bells of the cathedral burst forth in peal after peal 
of gladness. Galvez, the Visitador-General, was in 
ecstacies over the success of the expedition he had 
sent out upon strange seas and into still stranger 
lands. The Viceroy, the Marquis de la Croix, was 
congratulated on every hand. Next day a solemn 
Mass of thanksgiving was celebrated in the cathedral, 
attended by all the high dignitaries, the military and 
civic authorities and the whole people. 

An account of the discovery was printed and dis- 
tributed broadcast among the populace, creating the 
most intense excitement. An official statement of the 
event was made out and forwarded to Spain, relating 
the fact that the throne of Castile and Leon had for 
two centuries sent vessels to the coast of California, 
terminating at last in the establishment of the Pre- 
sidio and Mission of San Carlos at Monterey, June 
3, 1770. 

The ceremony of taking possession of Monterey 



102 CALIFORNIA 

for Spain, on June 3, 1770, took place under the same 
oak tree where Sebastian Vizcaino had camped and 
erected a cross 167 years before, namely, in the year 
1602. There are trees in many parts of the world 
that have histories, but none has a story more fas- 
cinating than this tree, now called the ''Serra 
Tree." It was a magnificent specimen of the live 
oak for which Monterey is stiU famed, as, let us hope, 
it wiU ever be. It grew at the end of a little cove or 
estuary of the bay at the present entrance to the Pre- 
sidio. In its place is a costly, handsome and well- 
meaning granite cross, erected by a generous-hearted 
lover of Monterey and her past. But how a lifeless 
stone can take the place of a living tree, it were hard 
to say. 

In the tumble and wreck and ruin of once great 
days there came to Monterey some who neither under- 
stood nor revered the past and its mighty memories. 
They built a culvert around the old tree, walling it 
with stone that yet did not keep from it the seeds of 
death. And so, one day, a patriarch of a noble tribe 
withered and died and became an eyesore on the 
ancient highway. Then when the man came along 
with the stone cross, the tree was ruthlessly torn out 
and flung heedlessly — and with what ingratitude only 
the spirits of the dead can know — into the waters of 
the bay. 

But just as the thievish tides were about to run 
away with the grand old trimk, still mighty in death, 
carrying it to the hungry and engulfing sea, two men 
of Monterey put out upon a scow and fought with the 
tides for the precious burden. With grappling hooks^ 
and after an heroic struggle, the dead patriarch was 
brought to shore and carried in a cart to the Royal 
Chapel of San Carlos in the town. There it was 
embedded in cement and treated to a chemical process 



MONTEREY THE FIRST CAPITAL 103 

of bathing that will cause it to last as long as time 
itself. 

In the year 1770, at the very beginning of things, 
with the arrival of Junipero Serra, Father President 
of the Missions, and Don Gaspar de Portola, the first 
Governor of California, Monterey became the seat 
of both the religious and civil authority in the new 
Spanish province of California. It was, therefore, 
from Monterey that everything which concerned both 
the religious and civil government originated, for a 
period of nearly eighty years— from the founding of 
the Mission to the constitutional convention which 
marked the entrance of California into the American 
Union as a sovereign state. The Presidio of Mon- 
terey was called ''The Royal Presidio" because it 
was located at the capital and therefore stood in the 
place of the King. And the church at San Carlos, 
near by, was called ''The Royal Chapel" because it 
was the church in which the King would have wor- 
shiped had he actually existed in the flesh in his new 
California possessions. There were no other pre- 
sidios or churches in California, from first to last, to 
which the title "royal" was or could have been ap- 
plied. The church of San Carlos in Monterey, built 
in 1794, which is still standing in an excellent state of 
preservation, was used as the church of the parish, 
and took the title "Royal Chapel of the Presidio of 
Monterey" — the same title that was borne by its rude 
and impretentious predecessor, the first temporary 
church building, long since vanished in the dust. 
Into this church have been gathered many priceless 
relics of the past, saved from Carmelo after its spo- 
liation. These relics include a number of articles 
which were used personally by Father Junipero, both 
m his priestly administrations and in the domestic 
life of the little adobe house in which he dwelt. 

Monterey having been established as the civil, 



104 CALIFORNIA 

religious and military capital of California, it also 
became, naturally, the center of social life. The 
memory of the glory of Monterey and the color of 
the gay life that was lived there through so many 
stirring years lingered long after the place had been 
stripped of its power. It is a memory that lingers 
still. It was not only the central government, but 
the central port, as well — the place in which author- 
ity from without was received and from which it was 
promulgated and disseminated for the guidance of 
the pueblos and ranchos with their alcaldes and over- 
lords, all up and down the golden coast of glory. 

It is, therefore, an easy feat for the imagination to 
picture old Monterey as she was in her days of power 
and splendor. The busy streets were filled with 
gorgeously caparisoned horses, frequently a rider 
sitting in a saddle worth a thousand dollars and hold- 
ing the rein of a bridle worth half as much, so orna- 
mented were they with gold and silver. You would 
have seen doffed to a lady in those times a gold or 
silver trimmed sombrero worth the good beginnings 
of a fortune. All was life and color. Fashion drew 
to this central throne the wit, the wealth and beauty 
of the entire country that lay between San Francisco 
and San Diego. 

And, side by side with power and pride, jostling 
elbows with them on the highways and byways of 
Monterey, were always the flotsam and jetsam of life, 
wanderers from far-away dim and mystic ports, deep- 
sea sailors, whalers, pearl-fishers, soldiers of fortune, 
Yankee skippers, pirates and bandits, world without 
end. It was in Monterey that Tiburcio Vasquez, a 
gentleman of the road no less famous than Juan 
Murietta, was born and bred. It was from the streets 
of Monterey that he sallied forth to waylay the trav- 
eler on the inland trails, even as the pirates of the 
coast sallied forth to sea from the harbor of Monterey 



MONTEREY THE FIRST CAPITAL 105 

to intercept a cargo. It was a favorite trick of tlie 
pirates to change the location of the Point Pinos 
light as an encouragement to a ship to dash itself 
upon the rocks. Those were brave days, indeed, and 
it seems not so long ago since those who remembered 
and mourned them were sitting against the adobe 
walls of Monterey, thankful for a ray of sunshine to 
warm their poor old lonely bodies. At the bottom of 
the harbor lie the bleached and whitened bones of 
many a ship that came to Monterey, preferring, for 
often unknown reasons, to sink than to go away. 
Among these is the frigate Natalia, on which Napo- 
leon escaped from Elba. 

The life that the people lived in California, in the 
days when Monterey was at the height of its great- 
ness, was a life that probably cannot return to Cali- 
fornia nor to any other part of the globe where a 
similar state of affairs has ever existed. The world 
has changed. Life is now a strenuous thing filled 
with hurry and scurry. If men sit down now to a 
feast at night they must be at their counting-houses 
at a fixed hour next morning, or at their shops and 
factories when the whistles blow, but in the old days 
when California was young — *'in the good old days 
of the king," as it used to be said — those who sat 
down to the feast departed not from the house of 
their host the next day, nor the next week, for that 
matter, unless they were so inclined. There was 
nothing concerning themselves to call them away, and 
the longer they remained under the roof where they 
had gathered, the better pleased was the man who 
owned the roof. 

There will never again be seen upon this earth, per- 
haps, a life so ideal as that which was lived in Mon- 
terey and throughout aU California in its halcyon 
days before the ''Grmgo" came. There was room 
to breathe and a man could sit on a hilltop and look 



106 CALIFORNIA 

upon the sea anywhere. The country was gorgeous 
with wild flowers more beautiful even than the 
flowers which grow in California's gardens of won- 
der today. The land was fat with plenty and every 
door was flung wide with welcome to whomsoever 
might come. There was no hurry, no envy, no grief, 
Though you had no house of your own it were no 
cause for distress. You had but to speak at the first 
threshold you met, ask for food and shelter for your- 
self and beast, and they to whom you came would 
answer you saying: '*Pase, listed, es su casa, Senor." 
(Enter, it is your house.) If you fared forth to eat 
and sup with a friend who had invited you, you 
brought with you those whom you might happen to 
have met upon the way. 

In those days California had come to have many 
vast and rich estates possessed and peopled by the 
best blood of Spain. The children of the Dons grew 
up to be handsome men and beautiful women. The 
young men were brave and manly and much given to 
dress and chivalry. From the Valley of the Seven 
Moons southward to the Harbor of the Sun, Cali- 
fornia had many Spanish belles whose fame and 
beauty were toasted at the feast and for whose hands 
there was much chivalric rivalry and not infrequently 
the flash of swords drawn on the field of the duello. 
And of all this, Monterey was the center. There are 
many legends of the belles of Monterey, but the one 
most often told is the legend of the "Pearls of 
Loreto. ' ' 

The way it runs is, that there was once in Mon- 
terey a seiiorita whose wondrous beauty was above 
the beauty of all the women of the land — the talk of 
California. Her casa was ever thronged with suitors 
for her hand and favor. Her name was Ysabel Her- 
rera, but they called her "La Favorita." 

In those times Monterey was a great pearl-fishing 



MONTEREY THE FIRST CAPITAL 107 

ground and many fortunes were made in that way, 
but in still earlier times, when the padres had things 
more to themselves, they had put the Indians to div- 
ing and as a result they had gathered together the 
most wonderful and valuable collection of pearls 
known to be in existence anywhere in the world. The 
padres had gathered these pearls not for sale, but for 
the purpose of decorating the statue of Our Lady, the 
Blessed Virgin, in their monastery at Loreto in 
Lower, or Baja, California. Every perfect pearl 
brought up from the waters of Monterey or any- 
where else along the California coast was taken by 
the Indians to the padres who, in turn, strung it upon 
the robe or around the neck of the statue of Our Lady 
of Loreto until that wooden image in that far-olf 
lonely place glowed in the soft light of the chapel, 
by day and night, with thrice a king's ransom. 

Now, as it happened, Ysabel Herrera craved pearls, 
and she told all her suitors that she. would marry the 
one who would bring her a rope of these jewels that 
would outshine the like possessions of all other 
women. It was then that Vincent de la Vega, a 
young caballero, conceived the terrible idea of rob- 
bing Our Lady at Loreto of her store of priceless 
pearls, which he did, stabbing to the heart the old 
priest who guarded the church. He galloped back 
over the long trails and the wild mountains from Baja 
California to Monterey, and laid in the lap of Ysabel 
Herrera the stolen pearls. 

The senorita kept her word and accepted De la 
Vega. That night there was a grand ball at which 
the elite of Monterey, the Governor, the high officers 
of the Royal Presidio, and the high-born patricians 
attended. Ysabel, glorious with pearls, entered the 
ballroom on De la Vega's arm, and instantly there 
was a hush of adoring admiration. An instant later, 
a young Franciscan, sandaled, shaven, and cowled, 



108 CALIFORNIA 

entered the room, pointed at the pearls and accused 
De la Vega of their theft, and of murder as well. 
The guilty pair fled for the bay, hoping to reach a 
ship that was about to sail. As they skirted the cliff 
on shore, a shot rang out and De la Vega feU dead. 
Clasping her lover in her arms, Ysabel leaped with 
his body into the sea, where she died with him. The 
pearls were never found, although the search for them 
in the waters of the bay is kept up until this very day. 

The great occasions in the old life of Monterey 
were those when the Governor gave a reception, and, 
of course, a ball, or when the wealth and beauty and 
officialdom of California gathered at the capital to 
welcome the coming of a new Governor. When these 
events took place, the great overlords of the ranchos, 
with their sons and daughters, and each with an 
entourage of Indian servants and retainers, gathered 
at the capital. The Fathers of the Missions usually 
came also, for the social life of the Spaniards was 
always closely interwoven with their religious life. 
Preceding the festivities, or sometimes while they 
were under way, there would usually be a procession 
headed by the dignitaries of the Church across the 
green pine-clad hill from Monterey to Carmelo. 

The accounts of these great festivities read like 
chapters from the doings in fairyland. At such times 
the presidio and the patio and church of the Mission 
would be gaily decorated. The soldiers in their 
picturesque and flashy uniforms, particularly the 
officers, made a brilliant show. Cavalry and artil- 
lery^ entered the church to attend the grand Mass to 
the salute of cannon and musketry without. The 
caballeros, stunningly arrayed, cantered through the 
crowds on the finest horses in the land, bred at Mis- 
sion San Antonio. Afterwards, there were bull- 
fights, feats of horsemanship, sham battles between 
the soldiery, and Indian dancing and games. At night 



MONTEREY THE FIRST CAPITAL 109 

came a great banquet, with the witchery of Spanish 
music, and dances attended by beautiful dark- 
eyed women, richly gowned and jeweled, escorted by 
the gallants of the province. 

The repression of pirates, who quite frequently 
pestered the coast of California, and occasional 
threats of attacks from foreign nations were just suf- 
ficient throughout the years of Monterey's suprem- 
acy to keep up the fighting-blood of the people. The 
most notable battle, however, and perhaps the only 
real battle ever fought at that historic fort, took place 
in 1817, when two ships appeared in the harbor to 
attack the settlement. They were privateers under 
command of an American named Brown and they 
were fresh from piratical conquests on the coasts of 
Chili and Peru. They were known as the ''Buenos 
Ayres Insurgents." One of their ships, the Argen- 
tina, carried thirty-eight guns, while the other, the 
Santa Rosa, carried twenty-eight. On board the 
vessels were more than five hundred fighting-men. 
Monterey had had news of the enemy's approach 
beforehand and was prepared to repel the invaders. 
The whole coast was on the lookout and a constant 
communication had been kept up between all points 
and the capital. The military strength of Monterey 
was outnumbered by the enemy, ten to one, yet in 
answer to the invaders' demand for surrender of the 
fort. Governor Sola sent back word that he would 
not surrender but stood ready to defend the King's 
flag to the last drop of his own blood and the blood 
of the men under his command. 

Ordering all the families living at Monterey to 
depart from the zone of battle, the Governor took his 
station in the tower of San Carlos church and the fight 
began. The privateers hurled shot after shot upon 
the devoted fort, to which the defenders on shore 
made no reply. Thinking that the Calif ornians were 



110 CALIFORNIA 

too frightened to defend themselves, the insurgents 
ran close to shore, whereupon the fort opened up a 
deadly fire on the enemy. The insurgents, at first 
greatly surprised, soon recovered, and landed four 
himdred men, who at once marched against the pre- 
sidio. The Californians then retreated to a distant 
rancho. The insurgents after remaining in Mon- 
terey five days, burying their dead and repairing one 
of their vessels which had been badly damaged, set 
sail, making no further attempt to ravish the port. 

In the meantime the Governor had collected a large 
force and returned to retake Monterey, only to find 
that the enemy had abandoned the fruits of victory, 
whatever they might have been. 

This tale, in itself a drama, breathes the very atmos- 
phere of old Monterey. Nor did the coming of the 
Gringo put an end to romance. In many ways, the 
American invasion but added to the glamor that had 
always been there, for it is then we begin to hear of 
blue-eyed men losing their hearts to black-eyed 
women, with all the attendant adventure that could 
not but ensue. It was on July 7, 1846, that Commo- 
dore Sloat raised the American flag on the staff of 
the custom-house, from which he tore the flag of Mex- 
ico. The staff is still there, and there is something 
of a thrill in the sight of it. Among the young Ameri- 
can army lieutenants who came later in the service to 
Monterey was William Tecumseh Sherman, who 
never, till his dying day, failed to kiss every pretty 
girl he met. 

They will show you a house in Monterey where 
lived the Seiiorita Bonifacio, loveliest of the maidens 
on all the sunny stretches of El Camino Real. Sher- 
man fell in love with her and when he was ordered 
away, they together planted a rose bush that was to 
tell in the days of his absence if his love for his dusky- 
eyed sweetheart remained true. The life or death 



MONTEREY THE FIRST CAPITAL 111 

of the rose tree was to be the proof. The tree blooms 
stiU, under which the senorita waited in vain for her 
lover to return. But we find ourselves wondering if 
the memory of her loveliness, and the arbor where 
they sat in the moonlit nights, was not always with 
him, even in the days of his great glory under his 
bloody eagles at Shiloh, and on his deathless march 
to the sea. 

Besides having been the first capital of California, 
Monterey is the place of many other "first" things, 
such as the first wooden house, the first brick house, 
and a perfectly endless list of lesser first things, such 
as lanterns, candlesticks, carpenters' benches, bells, 
rolling-pins and weighing-scales. You might wander 
through the town, nosing your way through holes and 
corners for a year and a day without seeing all that 
is to be seen. 

It was inevitable, of course, that the first news- 
paper should make its appearance in Monterey. In 
1846 this publication made its premiere under the edi- 
torial management of a man named Semple who stood 
six feet and eight inches high in the buckskin clothes 
which he habitually wore. The paper was named the 
Californian, and was printed from type borrowed 
from the old Missions of the padres. In order to 
print the letter "w," it was necessary to combine two 
"v's" there being no "w" in the Spanish alphabet. 

Naturally, there came to Monterey in the trail of 
every other wanderer known to gypsy stars and lur- 
ing moons, the Bohemians who wrought in dreams 
with pen and brush — they who have ever given and 
are giving stiU to the world the best it has and getting 
in return nothing at all in life but great glory and 
many sighs when once they are safe with death and 
can no longer borrow the price of a meal or a bed from 
those who can easily give but greatly begrudge to 
do so. 



112 CALIFORNIA 

Immortal among the dreamers who found their 
way — only God knows how — to Monterey, was Rob- 
ert Louis Stevenson. You shall see the house wherein 
he lodged for a year and more, the restaurant where 
he had his meals, though he and old Jules Simoneau, 
who fed and loved him, are now with the dust. You 
shall set foot on the green pathways where he wan- 
dered and that are deathless now if for no other 
reason than that he touched them with his fancy. It 
was the year 1879 that Stevenson spent in Monterey, 
when he was thirty years old. 

Stevenson's purpose in coming to California was 
to be at once near Fannie Osbourne, whom he had 
met abroad and with whom he fell desperately in love. 
Her home was in San Francisco, where Stevenson af- 
terwards married her. He was pathetically poor at 
the time and most miserably ill, his state of health 
made much worse by a steerage voyage across the 
Atlantic and the overland journey to the coast in an 
emigrant train. The first we know of him in Cali- 
fornia is when some sheepherders in the Santa Lucia 
hills foimd him lying unconscious under a tree, his 
pockets empty, his face pinched with hunger and the 
telltale blood of broken lungs on his lips. They took 
him to their cabin and nursed him back to life. Then 
he drifted down to Monterey. 

The artists who were there at that time, and with 
whom Stevenson naturally formed a reciprocated 
attachment, had devised a method of securing ample 
drink from the Sanchez brothers ' saloon on an agree- 
ment with them to paint the saloon bar and other- 
wise to decorate the room. "You shall be deposited 
at Sanchez 's saloon where we take a drink, ' ' Steven- 
son wrote to Henly. Not long ago that marvelous 
bar, on which had been flung pictures from the 
brushes of Tavernier and Frenzeny, was sold for 
other uses to a local personage, who promptly had it 



MONTEEEY THE FIRST CAPITAL 113 

painted over with a thick coat of white, obliterating 
forever the last traces of the pictures, and thus ren- 
dering valueless an article through which a man 
could have grown ten times wealthy merely by trav- 
eling with it on exhibition from town to town where- 
ever a white man draws the breath of life. 

Portraying in playful mood what he would do with 
him were he suddenly to fall from the skies into Mon- 
terey, Stevenson wrote Henly what he desired him to 
believe was there the daily routine of his life : ' ' That 
shall deposit you at Sanchez's saloon, where we take 
a drink; you are introduced to Bronson, the local 
editor ('I have no brain music,' he says; 'I'm a 
mechanic, you see,' but he's a nice feUow) ; to Adol- 
pho Sanchez, who is delightful. Meanwhile, I go to 
the P. O. for my mail ; thence we walk up Alvarado 
street together, you now floundering in the sand, now 
merrily stumping on the wooden sidewalks ; I call at 
HadseU's for my paper; at length behold us installed 
in Simoneau's little white-washed back room, round 
a dirty tablecloth, with Francois the baker, perhaps 
an Italian fisherman, perhaps Augustin Dutra and 
Simoneau, himself. Simoneau, Francois and I are 
the three sure cards; the others, mere waifs. Then 
home to my great airy rooms, with five windows, 
opening on a balcony ; I sleep on the floor in my camp 
blanket ; you instal yourself abed. ' ' 

It must have gone hard with Henly not to break 
away from London — though he sat at banquet with 
the Queen — and fly to R. L. S., then in Monterey, but 
perhaps he knew how successfully the Prince of 
Dreamers could dissemble in sickness and poverty 
from out the brave hypocrisy of life. He was scarcely 
ever well in Monterey, and at times was beleaguered 
for many days at a stretch in his lonely room, fighting 
death, inch by inch, yet he loved Monterey and said 
so in many ways and in many places. When he was 



114 CALIFORNIA 

weU enougti lie used to take long walks, where, says 
he, "A great faint sound of breakers follows you high 
up into the inland canyons ; the roar of waters dwells 
in the clean empty rooms of Monterey as in a shell 
upon the chimney. Go where you will, you have but 
to pause and listen to hear the voice of the Pacific." 

Not Edinburgh, where he was born, nor Samoa, 
where he died, nor all the far-flung places where he 
wandered in his restless life, hold more charming or 
tenderer memories of Robert Louis Stevenson than 
Monterey. 

On a day that cannot be long in coming, the vast 
Caucasian exodus, that has been sweeping ever west- 
ward, shall pyramid itself on the western rim of the 
continent of America, even as it has done on the west- 
ern rims of other countries. When that day comes, 
what shall be left of old Monterey will be swept ruth- 
lessly away as a Dutch housewife would sweep the 
dooryards of Isleta were she to find herself compelled 
to domicile there. Tiled roofs, adobe walls, the an- 
cient seats of the mighty, the pirates' lair, the lovers' 
lanes and arbors, the dusty ways that knew the 
Padres' sandaled feet, the haunts of Bohemia — they 
wiU faU and crumble under the steeled tread of un- 
feeling and aU-conquering progress. Listen, and you 
shall hear the rumble of the monster's wheels crash- 
ing through the distance, even now. You must arise 
and hasten. 

But this Progress which we have been taught to 
serve in servile fear, leaping to obey its slightest com- 
mand, and to truckle at the mere uplift of its eye- 
brows, can never wholly take from Monterey the 
charm that warms it or the things that make it holy. 
The sea will be there, and the sky, till God calls back 
the one and roUs up the other as a scroll. The hills 
cannot be torn down and leveled as a roof is leveled 
and a waU is tumbled to the dust. No hand but God's 



MONTEREY THE FIEST CAPITAL 115 

can change the sweep of the white shore or the curve 
of the bay set deep with the caress of uplands and 
dun serranos. Nor shall the din of whistles and the 
clangor of wheels and beating hammers dull the ears 
that hear the voices of the Past. 

Forever and forever the road shall climb the green 
hill that lies between the singing tides of Monterey 
and holy Carmelo, where sleeps the dust of Father 
Junipero. The world may and does forget much, 
but it can never now forget him — the gentle, great- 
souled Franciscan who brought the light of Calvary 
to the darkness of a heathen land. Time goes ever 
on and its soul is the soul of change, but it shall bring 
with the coming years the feet of countless thousands 
yet unborn, to climb the road that leads to Carmelo 
from Monterey. 

Green is the way to Monterey, 
And once, upon a wandering day, 
With breath of mist and flash of sky, 
My feet were where the green ways lie — 
My soul unleashed, my heart at play, 
Upon the road to Monterey. 

All in the morning's golden glow, 
I came by holy Carmelo 
Where whispers still its silvery stream 
Like voices from an ancient dream. 
And through the haunted silence beat 
The long-hushed tread of sandaled feet. 

Dream- wrapped in memory's mystic spell, 

I rang the rusted Mission bell. 

And called to hill and vale and sea 

To give their dead agam to me — 

The brown-robed priests, the altar lights. 

The hosts of dark-eyed neophytes. 



116 CALIFORNIA 

I called the dead years forth to free 

Their dust-thralled feet to trudge with me. 

So, fared as comrades with me, then, 

Fair women and brave riding men — 

By wood and dune, that dream-kissed day, 

They passed with me to Monterey. 

Blithe were the green ways then that told 

The gladness of the days of old; 

From chaparral, with flocks athrong, 

I heard the Indian herder's song. 

And ringing scythes, with laughter blent, 

From fields where dusky toilers bent. 

Madre de Dios! keep for me 

My dream of hill and sky and sea — 

The green ways where my path was set, 

The gay guitar and castanet. 

And stars that hailed, at close of day. 

The sunset roofs of Monterey. 



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V. 

THE SPANISH ERA 

The Spanish era in California had its tangible be- 
ginning in the year 1769 with the arrival of Junipero 
Serra and Gaspar de Portola at San Diego. It 
ended, politically, toward the end of the year 1822 
with the independence of Mexico when Iturbide at 
the head of his victorious army threw off the yoke 
of Spain and set up a separate Mexican empire with 
himself on the throne as the Emperor Augustin I. 
Of course California really became Spanish territory 
with its discovery by Cabrillo in 1542, but it was 
neither settled nor colonized in either Cabrillo 's time 
or in the time of Vizcaino, one hundred sixty- 
seven years later. California had its beginning as 
an entity of civilization in 1769, and during the fifty- 
three years of its existence as a Spanish province it 
made a history all its own. It left an impression on 
the country which lasts until the present day and 
which can never be wholly effaced. From it date 
many of the customs of the people of California, not 
to speak of the fact that land titles and other im- 
portant legal considerations owe to it their very exist- 
ence. 

During this Spanish era California was in itself a 
world apart from the great outside world which sur- 
rounded it. During the half century or more in 
which Destiny was quietly engaged between San 
Diego and San Francisco, Europe underwent the 
most tremendous throes in its history. The year that 
Jimipero Serra began his labors at San Diego was 
the same year in which the great Napoleon was born 



118 CALIFORNIA 

on the Island of Corsica. The French Revolution 
rose and fell, Marengo, Austerlitz and Waterloo 
were fought. The little Corsican had butchered 
Europe into subjection to his will. His throne had 
been set up and had tottered to its fall. The whole 
map of Europe had been changed during those years 
when a handful of Spanish soldiers and a few Span- 
ish Franciscan missionaries had succeeded in trans- 
forming California from a heathen land to a Chris- 
tian province. 

With the exception of San Francisco de Solano at 
Sonoma, all the old Missions of California were 
founded and established during the Spanish era. In 
those fifty-three years an entire savage race was re- 
deemed from nakedness and ignorance, physical as 
well as intellectual poverty, and heathenism. It was 
the Spanish era of California that built El Camino 
Real — the King's Highway. It was during the same 
time — from 1769 to 1822 — that the old pueblos which 
are now the great cities of Los Angeles and San Jose 
were founded and established. 

It may indeed be said that all that California is 
now or all that it can ever be owes its f oimdation to 
the Spanish era. It was during those years that the 
state took on its present proportions, its geographical 
outlines were defined, its harbors surveyed and ex- 
plored, its civilization grounded and its relationship 
to the outside world established. It was an era not 
great with the tramp of armies or the assembling of 
vast populations but it laid deep foundations and 
held, through sacrifice and heroism, the trails which 
its pioneers had blazed by land and the pathways 
which its mariners had dared at sea. 

As far as the work of the Franciscan Missions is 
concerned with the Spanish era in California it is a 
story which stands by itself and is told in another 
chapter of this book. Herein shall be dealt with the 



THE SPANISH ERA 119 

civil and military features of the Spanish era, the 
work clone by the Spanish Governors of whom there 
were ten, beginning with Don Gaspar de Portola and 
ending with Don Pablo Vicente de Sola. 

Of these Governors there were at least two really 
great men and none can be fairly regarded as incom- 
petent. They were opposed by many obstacles and 
had to deal with serious difficulties. On the one hand 
was the missionary power and on the other hand was 
the power of the military. There was scarcely a 
time when the Spanish Governors were not called 
upon to reconcile these two opposing forces. They 
did not always succeed, but a majority of them ac- 
quitted themselves with credit. 

To clearly understand the position of a Governor 
of California during the Spanish era it is necessary 
to be informed that he stood as the direct represen- 
tative of the Viceroys of New Spain whose head- 
quarters were in Mexico and who were in turn the 
direct representatives of the Kingdom of Spain on 
the continent of North America. Wherefore the 
Spanish Governors of California had not only the 
difficult problems of the province to solve but they 
had also, in many instances, to contend with the 
whims of a Viceroy who, by reason of his location at 
a great distance and his lack of frequent communi- 
cation, was usually poorly informed as to Califor- 
nia's condition and needs. 

California must always remember with peculiar 
affection its first Governor, Don Gaspar de Portola. 
His term of service was very brief, lasting only about 
two years, with not much more than one year of actual 
experience in California itself, but his name is im- 
mortal in that he was the discoverer of the Bay of 
San Francisco, the world's greatest harbor. More- 
over, he was a brave and a good man, firm in the 
execution of the duties that were assigned to him, 



120 CALIFORNIA 

yet kindly of heart and gentle in his administrations. 
His name is forever linked with the name of Juni- 
pero Serra whose companion and friend he was. 
Portola needs no other patent than his selection by 
Don Jose Galvez to be the first Governor of Califor- 
nia. It is due greatly to the courage and the faith 
of Galvez that the christianization and colonization 
of California were effected in the year 1769. Galvez 
was the Visitador General of Mexico; the dream of 
a populated and civilized California was his dream, 
above that of all other men. Such a man was more 
than likely to select the best available instruments 
for the prosecution of any work he might have in 
hand. The world knows how unerring was his judg- 
ment of Junipero Serra, but it is not so familiar with 
the merit of Portola. 

When the expedition of 1769 started for San Diego 
a portion of it went by sea and another portion by 
land. Portola and Serra were with the land party. 
As the party passed through Lower California it was 
the Governor's unpleasant duty to turn over the 
property of the Jesuit missionaries to the Francis- 
cans, and the gentle and considerate manner in which 
this duty was performed is a clear index to the man's 
character. After his memorable march in search of 
Monterey, which resulted not in the finding of Mon- 
terey but in the discovery of San Francisco Bay, he 
returned to San Diego and then set back in company 
with Serra on the second attempt to find Monterey, 
which was successful. After that he did little more 
than to see the missionaries settle down to work. 
Leaving a sufficient number of soldiers for the pro- 
tection of the padres, he returned to Mexico and never 
saw California again. 

Portola was succeeded by Felipe de Barri, the sec- 
ond Governor of California. He took office at Lo- 
reto early in the year 1771. Governor Barri 's ad- 



THE SPANISH ERA 121 

ministration was a stormy one from the beginning to 
the end of its three and a half years' duration. He 
found trouble on his hands at the very outset, or it 
might perhaps be better said, he made trouble for 
himself. Pedro Pages and Rivera y Moncada, offi- 
cers in command of the military, had already begun 
to insist on their authority over the Missions when 
Barri came into authority in 1771. The idea of the 
Viceroy and of the Visitador General, Jose de Gal- 
vez, was that the civil and military government of 
California existed mainly for the purpose of protect- 
ing the Missions. Governor Barri sided in with 
Pages and Moncada and proceeded more or less to 
harass Pather Junipero and the missionaries. The 
quarrel proceeded with considerable bitterness for a 
period of about two years, when Pather Jimipero set 
out for Mexico to put the case before the Viceroy. 
Serra walked nearly every step of the way and by the 
force of his great character won the Viceroy over to 
the missionaries' view of the matter with the result 
that Barri and Pages were removed from office in 
October, 1774. 

Barri was succeeded by Pelipe de Neve, the third 
Governor of California. The only important feature 
of Governor Barri 's administration was the procla- 
mation of the Viceroy, Bucareli, conferring on the 
Government of California authority to make land 
grants. This was done in 1773 with the permanent 
colonization of California by Spanish settlers in view. 
It seems that the authority to make these grants was 
first vested in Captain Rivera y Moncada and that 
in virtue of it the first private land grant in Califor- 
nia was a concession of a lot to a soldier named 
Manuel Butron and his Indian wife, Margarita. The 
groimd was 140 varas square, located at Mission San 
Carlos. 

This man. Captain Rivera y Moncada, proved to be 



122 CALIFORNIA 

a prominent figure in the earlier years of the life of 
California. Aji appointment as Comandante of the 
military forces placed him in a strong position and it 
appears that he was not slow to take advantage of 
his power, having been a man of rather dominating 
and overbearing spirit. The two incidents in his 
career that stand out most prominently are his ex- 
communication from the Church by the missionaries 
and his quarrel with Juan de Anza, the famous 
Captain of Tubac. The excommunication of Captain 
Eivera came about through a quarrel that he had 
with the missionaries at San Diego over the posses- 
sion of an Indian who had been charged with murder. 
Eivera demanded that the Indian be turned over to 
him for summary punishment, but the missionaries 
refused to surrender the prisoner on the ground that 
he had fled to the church for * ' sanctuary. ' ' A stormy 
scene ensued during which the missionaries held the 
ground they had taken and wound up by excommu- 
nicating Eivera. The Captain then hastened to Mon- 
terey for the purpose of appealing to Father Juni- 
pero, the Father-President of the Missions. On the 
way he does not seem to have cooled his temper and 
his manner towards Father Junipero, upon meeting 
him, was no less insolent than it had been towards 
the padres at San Diego. 

It may be that the soldier had cause to be in a tem- 
per. The time is too far past to judge of the merits 
of the case. All we know is that Captain Eivera is 
regarded by no historian as a man of more than 
mediocre ability. The chances are that he overesti- 
mated his own importance and, like many other mili- 
tary officers of both ancient and modem times, exag- 
gerated his sense of dignity. Father Junipero was 
not the man to be browbeaten, and the consequence 
was that Eivera obtained no satisfaction at Monterey. 

It is fascinating to picture in imagination the 



THE SPANISH ERA 123 

quarrel that took place between Rivera and Juan de 
Anza. The old Captain of Tubac was a sturdy and 
noted figure in those distant times. He was the first 
man to blaze the inland trail from Sonora to Mon- 
terey, carrying his expedition through without the 
loss of a human being or an animal or any of his 
cattle, though he had to cross trackless deserts, and 
make a trail where no man had ever made one before. 
It was upon the occasion of de Anza's second visit 
to California that the differences between him and 
Rivera arose. The two met at Mission San Gabriel, 
where they combined their forces and marched to 
San Diego for the purpose of meting out punishment 
to the Indians who had attacked the Mission, burn- 
ing it to the ground and murdering Father Jayme, 
in November, 1775. When San Diego was reached, 
de Anza with his usual forcefulness, proposed that 
they attack the Indians without delay. This Rivera 
refused to do, proposing on the contrary that they 
move slowly and with caution. Upon hearing this 
decision de Anza immediately washed his hands of 
the whole business and marched to Monterey. He 
had with him a number of settlers from Sinaloa who 
were to be located at San Francisco. He proposed 
to execute his commission at once, but to this Rivera 
objected also. Later on, when de Anza was proceed- 
ing south on his way to Sonora and Rivera was pass- 
ing north, their two little armies camped in the Val- 
ley of San Antonio. A few bitter words were all that 
passed between the two. Rivera, through his orderly, 
handed a letter to de Anza with instructions to the 
Captain of Tubac to deliver it to the Viceroy in Mex- 
ico. The Captain of Tubac contemptuously declined 
to touch the letter. That swords were not drawn is 
the wonder of it all, but the scene must have been 
picturesque even as it was, with the fire flashing from 
the black eyes of the two Captains. 



124 CALIFORNIA 

As far as the military was concerned, things were 
not going very weU in California and it was plain to 
be seen that Felipe de Neve, the new Governor, could 
not come too soon. 

Gov. de Neve arrived in Monterey in February, 
1777, fully informed as to the unsatisfactory condi- 
tions that existed in California and as fully deter- 
mined to do all in his power to make harmony. He 
made friendly advances at once to Father Junipero 
and continued to be on good terms with the mission- 
aries throughout his entire administration with the 
exception of a few disagreeable experiences which, 
however, had no important bearing. 

Felipe de Neve was a soldier as well as a states- 
man, having been at the time of his appointment as 
Governor of California a cavalry officer at Queretaro 
in Mexico. His fame as a California Governor rests 
upon the fact that he was the f oimder of the old Span- 
ish pueblos of San Jose and Los Angeles. He is also 
famous as the author of what was termed the **Eegla- 
mento," a complete code of legislation for the Prov- 
ince of California which he promulgated in June, 
1779, dating it from the ** Royal Presidio of San 
Carlos de Monterey. " This code made provision for 
the conduct of the presidio down to the minutest 
detail for the support of the troops and the families 
connected with the military service. It also regu- 
lated the procedure for the settlement of the coun- 
try, setting forth laws for the establishment and gov- 
ernment of pueblos and towns and making rules for 
the promotion of agriculture, stock-raising and other 
branches of industry. The Reglamento was indeed 
a very statesmanlike document and is so regarded to 
this day by good authorities. 

It was in the Place of the Two Shrines that de 
Neve erected the first legal California pueblo or town. 
The Place of the Two Shrines is the Valley of Santa 



THE SPANISH ERA 125 

Clara, where are the Mission Santa Clara and Mis- 
sion San Jose, the only locality that can boast of two 
of the ancient Franciscan establishments. The 
pueblo was named in honor of Saint Joseph and is 
the present City of San Jose. Thus San Jose is the 
oldest legally founded city of the Golden State. 

It was the poHcy of Spain and consequently the 
policy of de Neve to build towns near all the Mis- 
sions. We are to remember the idea was not only to 
christianize California but to colonize it, as well. 
And the time came when Gov. de Neve received his 
instructions from Mexico to go ahead and erect 
pueblos near the various Missions as speedily as 
might be. Accordingly he instructed Don Jose Mo- 
raga, Lieutenant-Commandant of the Presidio of 
San Francisco, to march with nine soldiers skilled in 
agriculture and five pablodores, or settlers, to Santa 
Clara Valley and establish a pueblo. Moraga went 
forth promptly in obedience to his orders and in due 
time reached the spot selected by the Governor. The 
march from San Francisco was no more than a pleas- 
ant journey of two or three days. The party soon 
left the waters of the great Bay behind them and 
came at length to the banks of a little stream shaded 
by splendid oaks where happened to be gathered the 
padres of the Missions Santa Clara and San Jose. 

But this was not the site selected for the new pue- 
blo, nor had the gathering of the brown-robed friars 
aught to do with the coming of Don Jose Moraga or 
his pablodores. Yet the spot and the occasion were 
both interesting. The place of the streamlet and the 
oaks was about midway between the two Missions 
and was called *'La Penetentia." Here, every two 
months, came the padres to confess their sins to one 
another. 

Having made dutiful obedience to the Reverend 
Friars, Don Moraga continued farther, traveling a 



126 CALIFORNIA 

matter of perhaps seven miles more until he came 
to a curve of a bright and leaping river which was 
caUed Guadalupe. There he ordered a halt, and 
there he unsheathed his sword, drove its point into 
the rich black loam, sajdng: ''Here, in the name of 
God and our Sovereign King, shall we build the 
Pueblo of San Jose." It was the twenty-ninth day 
of November, 1777. 

The pueblo was carefully and duly surveyed into 
solars or house lots, and suertes or lands for cultiva- 
tion. The first grant, a solar, was made to Igna- 
cio Archuleta. A surprised soul would be Ignacio 
Archuleta could he now come back to barter in Amer- 
ican dollars for that lone town lot which designated 
his household officially and immortally as "the first 
family of San Jose," with all the social preeminence 
which the title should imply. 

The founding of the Pueblo of Los Angeles was 
even more impressive than the f ovmding of the first 
pueblo. Gov. de Neve conducted the establishment 
in person. He first repaired from the Capital at 
Monterey to the Mission San Gabriel from which, 
on a sunny morning, he fared forth at the head of a 
party of soldiers, padres from the Mission, neophyte 
Indians and the pablodores who were to be the bul- 
wark and the pillars of the new town. Twelve house 
lots were located on three sides of a Plaza, each lot 
having a frontage of one hundred varas and a depth 
of two hundred varas. The original population was 
arranged to consist of nine families. Suertes, or 
lands for cultivation, were parceled out among the 
nine pablodores and an irrigation ditch was surveyed 
from the Los Angeles River, which stream was then 
known by the name of *'Porciuncula." The cere- 
monies attending the founding of the Pueblo con- 
sisted of the raising of a cross, music and singing by 
the Indian choruses and the firing of a volley of 



THE SPANISH ERA 127 

musketry by the soldiers. The official name given 
to the Pueblo was ' * The City of Our Lady the Queen 
of the Angels," the modern abbreviation of which is 
Los Angeles. The date of the foundation was Sep- 
tember, 1781. A few years afterward the citizens 
contributed five hundred head of cattle to build the 
famous old Plaza Church which still stands as a 
Southern California landmark. 

Felipe de Neve served as Governor of California 
from October, 1774, until September, 1782. His 
striking abilities were such that he became marked 
for a higher honor. The King of Spain decorated 
him with the Royal Order of Charles III, raised him 
to the rank of Colonel and made him Inspector Gen- 
eral of all the troops of the Provincias Internas, 
which included Sonora, New Mexico, Chihuahua, 
Coahuila, Texas and both the Californias. This 
necessitated de Neve's removal to Chihuahua, where 
he was soon still further honored by the King with 
an appointment to be a General of Brigade. He died 
at Chihuahua in the latter part of the year 1784. 

The following eight years in California, from 
September, 1782, until September, 1790, were un- 
eventful. They marked the gubernatorial reign of 
Pedro Pages, who, it will be remembered, was for 
some time a Lieutenant of Infantry in command of 
a company of Catalonian Volunteers at San Diego. 
He had before served as ad interim Governor of 
California between the time of the departure of 
Portola and the arrival of Gov. Felipe de Barri. 
Pages was a man of no initiative, appearing to have 
been a good enough soldier but without much capabil- 
ity as a statesman. He was very energetic in ful- 
filling the duties of his office, writing a great many 
letters and making many rather fruitless efforts to 
place the presidios in an effective condition. 

Pages seems to have burdened himself with un- 



128 CALIFORNIA 

necessary troubles, added to which was one real 
trouble in the form of a jealous and querulous wife. 
The Senora Fages was the first woman of any pre- 
tensions to come to California, and it may be said 
that she was the first society leader. She was pos- 
sessed of a very exalted notion of the importance of 
her station as the wife of the Governor, and exacted 
rigid deference and respect to her person from aU the 
people of the province, high and low alike. Her 
husband, the Governor, was undoubtedly a man of 
good moral character, yet the Senora frequently ac- 
cused him of infidelity, while, as a matter of fact, the 
only distinction to which Gov. Pages was entitled is 
due to the fact that he insisted upon the strictest 
moral conduct among all the officers of his presidio 
and the Alcaldes of the pueblos. There is in the 
archives a stinging letter which Fages addressed to 
Ignacio Vallejo, Alcalde of San Jose, in which the 
Governor unmercifully castigated the Alcalde for im- 
moral conduct, saying that the Alcalde had been com- 
missioned in the belief that he would suppress im- 
morality instead of himself presenting so scandalous 
an example. This letter and other records show that 
the Pueblo of San Jose was a rather dissolute estab- 
lishment and that its citizens were not in the habit 
of leading exemplary lives. 

The administration of Gov. Jose Antonio Romeu 
was even less eventful than that of his predecessor, 
Pedro Fages. Gov. Romeu came to California a 
sick man, suffering from a serious disease which even 
Pablo Soler, the great Surgeon of the Province, could 
not cure. And Pablo Soler was really a great physi- 
cian as well as a great surgeon. He was a learned 
man and sacrificed many years of his life to the wel- 
fare of the people of California. He traveled many 
weary miles ministering to the afflicted officers and 
soldiers of the presidios, the padres and Indians of 



THE SPANISH ERA 129 

the Missions, and all the people, but he could not cure 
the disease from which Gov. Romeu suffered. After 
a year and seven months in office the Governor died 
at Monterey, whereupon Jose Dario Arguello, Co- 
mandante of the Presidio of Monterey, Lieut. Jose 
Francisco de Ortega of Loreto, Lieut. Felipe de 
Goycoechea of Santa Barbara and Ensign Hermene- 
gildo Sal of San Francisco gathered in council at 
Monterey and selected Capt. Jose Joaquin de Arrilla- 
ga of Loreto as the proper person to assume the office 
of temporary Governor and to act until a new Gov- 
ernor could be appointed. 

Jose Joaquin de Arrillaga, the sixth Governor, 
was as all his predecessors had been, a soldier. He 
had distinguished himself in campaigns against the 
Ladians. He arrived in Monterey early in 1793 and 
at once entered upon the duties of his office. In the 
few months during which Arrillaga occupied the 
office of Governor he concerned himself almost en- 
tirely with the presidios, endeavoring to improve 
their weak and extremely inefficient condition. He 
wrote a full report of the situation to the Viceroy 
and prepared for his successor an elaborate state- 
ment of the situation. Having done these things, 
Arrillaga did not await the arrival of his successor, 
but returned to Loreto. He was a very capable and 
painstaking official and was destined to return to 
California at a future time to once more sit in the 
chair of state. 

The man who succeeded Arrillaga as Governor of 
California was a character upon whom the historian 
and the teller of tales is tempted to dwell both 
lengthily and lovingly. He was Diego de Borica, 
California's seventh Governor, a gentleman and a 
scholar and in every respect a most fascinating per- 
son. He accepted the cares of the Province reluc- 
tantly, yet he fulfilled his duties with the utmost 



130 CALIFORNIA 

exactness and with a tact and ability so rare and 
striking as to deserve for his memory a far greater 
renown than it enjoys. 

His appointment to the exalted position of Gov- 
ernor of the Californias was a great promotion, yet 
it is clear that he did not welcome it. He loved good 
companions who were his peers in intellectual gifts 
and talents, and, down in Chihuahua where he re- 
sided, he was surrounded by a chosen circle of men 
whose tastes were similar to his own. He had a 
lovely wife and a sweet little daughter whom he loved 
devotedly and who were equally devoted to him. He 
was very happy and contented in Chihuahua. He 
probably was not ambitious for high honors if to 
secure them he must lose contentment. He knew 
that at Monterey he would not find the friendship 
that existed for him in the south and that the Senora 
Borica would not be so well bestowed and that the 
little Senorita would lose many advantages. Doubt- 
less he did not like to go, but he was a loyal son of 
Spain and did not shirk the duty that was before 
him. Such was his sunny nature that he made light 
of his troubles and bade his old friends goodby with 
a smile on his lips. 

The new Governor, accompanied by his wife and 
daughter, two chosen companions and a negro serv- 
ant, crossed the Gulf for Loreto, intending to make 
the journey to Monterey by sea. But the passage 
across the Gulf proved to be so violent that the good 
Seiiora and the little Senorita could no longer think 
of the ocean without disgust. Securing a number of 
good stanch mules and outfitting for an overland 
journey, the Governor arrived at Monterey with his 
household and entourage over the same trail that had 
been followed by Father Junipero and Don Caspar 
de Portola twenty-five years previously. Father 
Junipero was then dead several years and in his 



THE SPANISH ERA 131 

sandals Borica found the second Father President 
of the Missions, Eermin Francisco de Lasuen. 

At the time when Borica took up the reins of gov- 
ernment a very bitter feeling existed between the 
Missionaries and the Civil and Military authorities. 
Years of quarrel, misunderstandings and attempted 
encroachments, had resulted in complete estrange- 
ment. The missionaries sent constant complaints to 
the Viceroy in Mexico to the effect that the soldiers 
not only treated them with disrespect but also inter- 
fered with their work of christianizing the Indians. 
On the other hand, the soldiers complained that the 
missionaries were grasping and arrogant and op- 
posed to the Government's scheme of colonization. 
The military authorities believed that the Indian 
should be treated in a manner that would fit him for 
future citizenship and self-reliance, while the padres 
contended that to do this would be to defeat the In- 
dian's salvation. Father Junipero and all his suc- 
cessors, down to the last day, were emphatic in their 
assertions that if the aborigines were allowed to 
wander from the shelter of the Missions they would 
be corrupted morally and physically beyond all hope 
through contact with the soldiers and white settlers. 

Owing to these conditions, Diego de Borica found 
the ship of state tossing upon troubled waters, but 
he at once poured upon those waters the oil of his 
consummate tact and his great, generous, gentle 
wisdom. It is useless to say that no abuses existed 
in the conduct of the Missions. It is equally useless 
to say that it would have been wise to adopt the plan 
of treatment for the Indian which Borica 's civil and 
military predecessors had insisted upon. What faced 
the new Governor, therefore, was the problem of ex- 
tending and strengthening the country as a Spanish 
Province from a military and civic standpoint and at 
the same time not to destroy, by undue interference, 



132 CALIFOENIA 

the splendid work of the Fathers. To the great 
credit of Borica it may be said that, as far as his 
administration was concerned, the problem was 
handled with success. The disasters that came in 
after years both to the Crown of Spain and to the 
splendid dream of the Franciscans cannot be laid at 
the door of Diego de Borica. 

Upon his arrival at Monterey the Governor found 
in the harbor two English vessels commanded, re- 
spectively, by Capt. George Vancouver and Lieuten- 
ant Puget, whose names have been preserved not 
alone by the famous memoirs which Vancouver left 
behind, but by the fact that Vancouver's name is 
permanently connected with points on the map of the 
North Pacific Coast, while to Puget fell the honor of 
giving his name to that great inlet of the sea which 
bears the great argosies of today into the heart of 
Washington with its teeming cities. It was fortu- 
nate for Borica that these gentlemen happened to be 
at Monterey when he arrived. They were well 
equipped to contribute to the easement of his state of 
mind. They were fine fellows and, in the interchange 
of social pleasantries which ensued, the lockers of 
their ships contributed generously. Perhaps Bori- 
ca 's character and the character of Father Lasuen, 
whom Vancouver also met, greatly influenced the 
kindly impression that this great traveler formed of 
California and which has been perpetuated in his 
writings. 

The one great dream of Borica 's administration 
was to erect a great industrial city in California. 
The city was actually founded with the flaunting of 
many banners and the fanfare of trumpets, but its 
roofs fell into the dust and it is now no more than a 
memory, and a very dim memory at that. The site 
of it was adjacent to the Mission Santa Cruz, all 
traces of which have also disappeared. Over the 



THE SPANISH ERA 133 

dust of both the old Mission and the industrial city 
which Diego de Borica founded from his fondest 
hope rises now the beautiful modern California city 
of Santa Cruz, the people of which by other ways and 
by other methods have accomplished that which 
Borica failed to do. 

It came about in this way. In 1795 there were 
rumors of an invasion of California by France. In 
order to enable the province the more effectively to 
resist this invasion, the Marquis de Branciforte sent 
to California seventy-two Catalonian volunteers and 
eighteen artillerymen. The volunteers were under 
command of Lieut. Colonel Pedro de Albemi and 
the artillery was under command of Sergeant Jose 
Roca. The French invasion never took place, but 
the rumor proved fortunate for California from the 
fact that it brought to the province with the rein- 
forcements Alberto de Cordoba, an engineer of ex- 
ceptional ability and energy. Such a man was much 
needed in California, and Governor Borica rejoiced 
in the presence of Cordoba. The two became firm 
friends and when the danger of invasion had passed 
they joined their talents and energies to the end that 
certain enterprises long delayed might be carried out. 
Chief among these enterprises were the strengthen- 
ing of the coast defenses and the erection of new 
pueblos. 

While Cordoba, acting under instructions from 
Gov. Borica, was surveying the harbor of San Fran- 
cisco, he also kept in mind Spain's original intention 
of establishing additional pueblos. No new towns 
had been founded since the establishment of the 
pueblos of San Jose and Los Angeles by Gov. Felipe 
de Neve fourteen or fifteen years before. Neither 
San Jose or Los Angeles had made much progress, if 
any. They were still nothing more than wretched 
little settlements the inhabitants of which were 



134 CALIFORNIA 

scarcely able to keep bodies and souls together. 
Borica believed the reason these pueblos did not flour- 
ish was because the settlers had not been sufficiently- 
encouraged and assisted by the Government. He 
determined that the new industrial city which he was 
about to found should not lack such encouragement. 

Cordoba finally reported to the Governor that in 
all his inspection of the country the most promising 
spot for the location of the proposed new city was 
on the northern shores of the Bay of Monterey, with- 
in sight of the Mission Santa Cruz. Everything 
necessary for the support and progress of a town was 
there to be found — good land, plenty of water for 
irrigation, timber and a safe anchorage for vessels. 

It was decided that only the best class of colonists 
should be settled in the town. Some of them were 
secured in California and others were brought up 
from Mexico. Each colonist was given two horses, 
two mares, two cows, a yoke of oxen, two goats, two 
sheep, a musket, a plow and other necessary tools and 
implements. Cordoba laid out the town and built 
some houses of adobe with tiled roofs. The streets 
were arranged in straight and symmetrical lines and 
a system of sanitation installed. The town was called 
Branciforte, in honor of the Viceroy who had ap- 
proved all the plans and arrangements. 

Yet with all this encouragement and the generous 
and enthusiastic backing of Borica and Cordoba, 
Branciforte was doomed to failure. At the end of 
the first year it had a population of only forty souls. 
The crops had turned out well and there seemed to 
be no reason why Branciforte should not become all 
that it was hoped it would be. In the minds of the 
pablodores and people generally there was conceived 
a strange and unreasonable prejudice against the new 
city. They declined to settle there and those who were 
already inhabitants soon began to desert the place. 



THE SPANISH ERA 135 

In a pathetically short space of time the whole enter- 
prise, born amid so many high hopes, was utterly 
abandoned. It is a strange thing that the present 
great cities of California appear to have sprung into 
existence without the premeditation of the Spanish 
pioneer in whose very capable hands had been en- 
trusted the molding of California. Despite its 
wonderful harbor, neither the Spanish nor Mexican 
era ever contemplated the existence of a great city 
at Yerba Buena, where San Francisco now stands.. 
It was never thought that Los Angeles or San Jose 
would become anything more than villages at best. 

Cordoba, the engineer, had been sent to California 
solely for the purpose of strengthening its defenses, 
and while the town of Brancif orte was still struggling 
to hold itself on the map this capable man was re- 
called to Mexico, and in a few years more, when 
Borica had served nearly six years as Governor of 
California, he also set his face to the south, having 
received permission to shift the burdens of his re- 
sponsibilities to other shoulders. He was broken in 
health and perhaps shattered in spirits, owing to his 
inability to achieve so many things which he strove 
with aU his remarkable talent and energy to perform. 
He set sail from San Diego in January, 1800, looking 
his last on CaUfomia which he had learned to love 
and for whose happiness and welfare he had done so 
much. In the following year he died at Durango. 

It was with the appointment of a successor to 
Borica that the California of today took on practi- 
cally its present outlines, except that its northern 
boundary was vaguely understood. The southern 
boundary was fixed at a line about twenty miles south 
of San Diego, but the Province was supposed to ex- 
tend northward as far as there was any land — even 
perhaps to the north pole. The Russians were north 



136 CALIFORNIA 

of San Francisco, but the territory was considered 
as belonging to Spain. 

Thus for the first time an Alta or Upper California 
and a Baja or Lower California became distinctly 
established from the standpoint of civil and military 
government. As far as ecclesiastical government was 
concerned the demarkation had long been acknowl- 
edged, owing to the fact that the territory of the 
Dominican Order of Religious lay south of San 
Diego, while the territory of the Franciscans began 
at San Diego and extended indefinitely northward. 

Borica practically chose his own successor by 
recommending Jose Joaquin de Arrillaga to be the 
eighth Governor of California. Borica induced 
Arrillaga to apply for the position, and wrote a 
strong endorsement of the application to the Viceroy 
in Mexico. The Viceroy, in turn, also recommended 
Arrillaga 's appointment to the King, and in the year 
1800 Arrillaga returned to Monterey to take up the 
duties of a position which he had temporarily exer- 
cised previously between the years 1792 and 1794. He 
was destined to serve longer as Governor of Califor- 
nia than any other man who held that position under 
Spain either before or after his time. For fourteen 
long years — hard working years — was Don Jose Joa- 
quin de Arrillaga the Spanish Governor of the Prov- 
ince of California. His administration was dis- 
tinguished by his soldierly efforts to make California 
strong to defend itself against enemies from without 
and by the fact that he was exceptionally friendly to 
the Missions. Arrillaga was an intensely loyal son 
of the Church. He is the only Spanish Governor 
whose dust lies in California. He died at the lonely 
Mission of Soledad, July 25, 1814, and was buried 
there. 

Arrillaga was also the first of the Spanish Gover- 
nors to be clothed with full civil and roilitary power 



THE SPANISH ERA 137 

combined. His first thought, however, was to 
strengthen the military defenses, which he found in 
a pathetically weak condition. His predecessors, 
try as they would and as they did, to put California 
in a position to withstand the attacks of an enemy, 
found their efforts futile. They could not secure 
sufficient troops from Spain to create a formidable 
military establishment, nor would Spain give its far- 
away province the money necessary to erect fortifi- 
cations along the coast. The white population of 
California was too sparse for recruiting soldiers 
therefrom and the Indians were not of the proper 
caliber for military purposes. 

When Arrillaga began his rule in 1800 there were 
about four hundred persons included in the military 
establishment of the Province. Sixty-one soldiers 
were divided between Santa Barbara and San Diego. 
Sixty-five were at Monterey and thirty-eight at San 
Francisco. The remainder included the Catalonian 
volunteers and artillerymen who were scattered up 
and down the coast. There was a battery at San 
Francisco, one at San Diego and another at Mon- 
terey, but they were sadly inefficient. It was not 
girns and soldiery that saved California from the 
attacks of invaders but rather was it the remote posi- 
tion which the Province occupied on the map of the 
then known world, coupled with the universal belief 
that it was an impoverished country not worth in- 
vading. The entire population of California at that 
time was less than tiiirty thousand souls, less than 
three thousand of whom were white. This, of course, 
does not include the Indians not attached to the Mis- 
sions, the number of which there was no means of 
knowing. 

The white population, however, in which may be 
included offspring of whites who had married Indian 
women, was steadily increasing. Whatever increase 



138 CALIFORNIA 

there was came from births. There was Little or no 
immigration. At this time most of the whites in the 
north were domiciled at Branciforte, in Santa Cruz. 
The population of Los Angeles was two hundred 
sixty-nine, and that of San Jose one hundred 
eighty-seven, nearly all of whom were so lazy and 
shiftless in their habits as to place them below par 
even when compared with uncivilized Indians. There 
was a good deal of crime and disorder, especially in 
San Jose, which had in those far-away days a repu- 
tation as bad as it is now good, and Los Angeles was 
little if any better. San Francisco was nothing more 
than what the Mission made it, and Monterey (not 
including Carmelo) was purely a military post. 

Towards the correction of the morals of the Prov- 
ince as well as the strengthening of its military 
defenses, Gov. Arrillaga found that he must bend 
himself, and he did so with a will. He began by 
condemning to death a soldier of San Buenaventura 
who had been adjudged guilty of an unnatural crime. 
The Comandantes of the Presidios and the Alcaldes 
of the pueblos were forced by the new Governor to 
reform the moral conduct of the people, no matter 
at what hazard. The result was that California be- 
gan to be a better place. 

It was during the time of Arrillaga that California 
was destined to become better known to the world at 
large and its wonderful possibilities more fully and 
more widely realized. Traders began to make fre- 
quent visits, especially Yankee traders from far-away 
Cape Cod and other New England ports whose ships 
rounded the Horn laden with goods that California 
longed for and which the Yankees stood ready to 
barter for the hides and tallow and wines and other 
products of the Missions. Outside of the Mission 
establishments there was little or no attempt at agri- 
cultural or industrial output. The white men of the 



THE SPANISH ERA 139 

Province were either soldiers or dependents upon 
the civil list or residents of the pueblos who did not 
produce enough to sustain themselves, not to speak of 
producing something for sale. North of San Fran- 
cisco were numerous Russians who, besides engaging 
in fishing, now began to form agricultural communi- 
ties. Other outsiders in addition to the Yankees and 
the Russians occasionally appeared in the parts of 
California, and Governor Arrillaga was very uneasy 
and unhappy thereat. The responsibility of holding 
the Province for Spain against all comers devolved 
on him and he would have been better pleased had all 
these strangers who were coming to California's 
shores remained away and found other countries for 
the exercise of their activities. 

It was not so much that he was not a hospitable and 
courteous man by nature as it was that he feared 
invasion that Governor Arrillaga failed to treat 
strangers with cordiality. When Vancouver arrived 
at Monterey a second time the Governor gave him 
plainly to understand that he was not welcome. But 
strong as was the feeling against Vancouver and other 
English visitors, it was much stronger against Ameri- 
cans, although a treaty of friendship which defined 
boundaries and navigation between the United States 
and Spain had been duly proclaimed. Arrillaga and 
his people still preserved a haughty exterior. 

This attitude was distinctly in contrast with the 
kindly attitude which Diego Borica, Arrillaga 's 
predecessor, had shown. When, at one time the 
Yankee ship Otter, Capt. Ebenezer Dorr, had visited 
Monterey and surreptitiously left some of its sailors 
behind, Borica had given them work and had treated 
them kindly. 

In February, 1803, the American Brig Lelia Byrd 
anchored in the port of San Diego. The Coman- 
dante of that presidio immediately placed a guard 



140 CALIFORNIA 

on board the brig, ordered the captain to supply him- 
self with necessaries with the shortest possible delay, 
and commanded the brig to leave the harbor. But 
the Yankees, who had come for otter skins, were 
determined to get them. The captain sent out a boat 
stealthily by night to do some trading. The Co- 
mandante seized the members of the party and made 
them prisoners. 

In the morning the Americans on board the ship 
promptly landed in San Diego and rescued their 
fellow countrymen at the point of their pistols. The 
brig then wisely put out to sea, but as it was passing 
Point Guijarros, the fort opened fire on it from its 
nine pounders. The Americans returned the fire but 
no harm appears to have been done either on land or 
sea. Yet the adventure became famous though its 
only result seems to have been to bring Yankee and 
English and Russian ships in ever increasing num- 
bers to the ports of California, thus adding to the 
already heavy burden that lay upon the shoulders of 
Don Arrillaga, the loyal Governor. 

But as far as the Russians were concerned, a pleas- 
ant and romantic incident happened which greatly 
relieved the strain on Governor Arrillaga. The main 
object of the Russians was to engage in the fur trade. 
For the purpose of establishing a post at the mouth 
of the Columbia River, M. de Resnoff sailed down 
the coast from Siberia in 1806. Bad weather and 
other untoward conditions drove his ships far beyond 
the point of his destination and he ultimately 
put into the harbor of San Francisco. A courteous 
letter was dispatched to Arrillaga at Monterey, can- 
didly stating the purpose of the visit. Arrillaga re- 
plied, bidding the Russians welcome. While in the 
port, de Resnoff fell violently in love with Concepcion 
Arguello, daughter of the Comandante of the pre- 
sidio. They were engaged to be married and out of 



THE SPANISH ERA 141 

the incident a very good feeling sprang up between 
the Russians and Spaniards. De Resnoff set forth 
for his native land to acquaint the Czar of his pur- 
pose and to negotiate a pact between the Russians 
and the Spaniards of the Pacific Coast of North 
America. Upon his return he was to marry the lovely 
daughter of the Comandante, and great hopes in 
consequence were entertained by Governor Arrillaga 
and everybody concerned. But in crossing Siberia 
de Resnoff fell from his horse and was killed, the 
news leaving his dark-eyed sweetheart at the Port of 
Saint Francis inconsolable. Thus were dreams of 
love and dreams of empire shattered. 

It was also during the time of Governor Arrillaga 
that the first revolt against the power of Spain began 
in Mexico, but the disaffection did not reach Califor- 
nia, although knowledge of it had been borne along 
the sea. When Charles IV abdicated the throne of 
Spain in 1808 and was succeeded by Fernando VII 
(the news reaching California the following year), 
Arrillaga repaired to the Mission San Carlos and 
there, in the presence of the Franciscan padres and 
officers of the Royal Navy, knelt before the great 
crucifix in the church, placed the cross of his sword 
on the Bible and swore that he would bear true alle- 
giance to the new monarch, pledging thereto his 
sacred honor and the last drop of blood in his veins. 

Came then in 1810 the message that Miguel Hidal- 
go, the patriot priest of Mexico, had buckled his 
sword around his priestly robe and had taken the field 
at the head of the Aztec people for Mexican independ- 
ence. This news had no effect on Arrillaga or the 
people of California, who remained intensely loyal 
to the Crown of Spain, and there can be no doubt 
that had Arrillaga lived to see the day when the vic- 
torious Mexicans came to California to demand its 
surrender he would have refused, while life was in 



142 CALIFORNIA 

him, to haul down the flag of his king. But he did 
not live to see that day. He passed from this earth 
in the year 1814, within the sunny portals of Soledad, 
in the sixty-fourth year of his age. 

In the year's interim which occurred between the 
death of Arrillaga and the arrival of Sola, the tenth 
and last Spanish Governor of California, Jose Dario 
Arguello, the Comandante of Santa Barbara, occu- 
pied the office of Governor. He was the same 
Arguello whose daughter, Concepcion, captured the 
heart of the gallant Eussian officer, M. de Resnoff, 
at San Francisco several years before. 

And, in passing, as the memory of the grace and 
beauty of Concepcion Arguello rises before us from 
the ghostly mists of the past, we are reminded that 
California had by this time, in the year 1814, come 
to have many beautiful daughters. The white men 
of aristocratic birth and breeding whose destinies had 
been cast with California had reared about them not 
only beautiful daughters but handsome sons. These 
sons and daughters intermarried with other sons and 
daughters with the result that in the presidios and 
pueblos and on the great ranchos lying between the 
Harbor of the Sun and the Valley of the Seven 
Moons the foundations were laid of those great Cali- 
fornia families the names of which, through thou- 
sands of descendants and old landmarks, cluster with 
many tender memories around the fame of Califor- 
nia to this day. 

When Arguello had served about a year as Gover- 
nor of the Province, his successor, the renowned 
Pablo Vicente de Sola, the tenth and last Spanish 
Governor of California, arrived at Monterey with his 
entourage from Mexico. Sola was a native of Spain 
and intensely loyal to the Crown, his loyalty accen- 
tuated and strengthened by the disloyalty and the 
spirit of revolt then blazing into fury throughout 



THE SPANISH ERA 143 

New Spain. But California was an exception, the 
whole Province being as loyal to the TCing as was 
Sola, himself. When the new Governor arrived at 
Monterey he found himself in an atmosphere much to 
his liking, and he was welcomed as no man had ever 
been welcomed before in that place. 

It had required nearly three months for the new 
Governor to make the sea voyage from Mexico to 
Monterey, where he at last arrived safe and weU, 
August 30, 1815. Sola was then fifty-five years old 
and was the stately product of a life-long career of 
military and diplomatic training in the service of the 
King. His fame as an intense Loyalist was well 
known in the Province in which he came to rule. The 
wealth, the beauty and the very flower of all Califor- 
nia were waiting to greet him when his ship anchored 
in the bright waters of Monterey and he stepped from 
his shallop upon her cypressed shores. 

From far and near were gathered the troops to the 
presidios, cavalrymen mounted on the finest horses 
in the world, the Catalonian infantry in their leather 
jackets, the high officers plumed and in slashed 
breeches, velvet and laced and bucklered with golden 
swords; the cowled, brown-robed Brothers of St. 
Francis who had trudged from San Diego, San Luis 
Rey, San Gabriel, San Luis Obispo, San Francisco 
and all the Mission hospices that stood then, in the 
days of their glory, each one day's journey apart from 
the other on the sun-swept stretches of El Camino 
Real. There also were the beautiful women of Alta 
California gowned in silks and velvets and jeweled 
with the pearls that the Indian divers had brought 
up from the depths of the sunset sea. And, lastly, 
the pick of the Indian neophytes from the far-flung 
Mission shelters, bands of Indian choristers, Indian 
musicians and singers taught by the padres to draw 
exquisite music from flute and viol ; the dancing girls 



144 CALIFORNIA 

of Monterey with castanets and, peering from the 
dim aisles of pine and cypress, were the dark eyes of 
the still unregenerated Gentiles of a savage race who 
had not yet been gathered into the warmth and kind- 
liness of the fold. 

As Sola stepped ashore the cannon from the heights 
of the presidio thundered their welcome from their 
iron throats ; the troops were drawn up in a long line 
saluting the new Governor as he passed ; at the door 
of the Royal Church of San Carlos of Monterey the 
dignitaries of the California Missions awaited him, 
arrayed in gorgeous golden vestments, with little 
dark-eyed Indian acolytes swinging censers at their 
feet. As a loyal son of the Church, Sola's first act 
was to bow at the altars of his fathers in attendance 
upon the solemn Mass which was conducted that day 
in Monterey with all possible pomp and ceremony. 

In the afternoon there was a carnival of games and 
fiestas in the new Governor's honor. There were 
Spanish and Indian dances ; aU the sports known to 
the time were engaged in for his edification and de- 
light. Not the least thrilling number on the program 
was a tremendous encounter between a bull and a 
grizzly bear. At night there was a great banquet 
and a ball at which the Indian musicians furnished 
the music. Monterey was aflame with thousands of 
lights; bonfires burned from the darkness of the 
swinging hills. Had Pablo Vicente de Sola been the 
King himself, his welcome to Monterey could not 
have been more glorious. 

The next day Governor de Sola was escorted by 
the Padres and the multitude across the green hill 
that lies between Monterey and Carmelo. As he as- 
cended the brown highway he looked back and had 
his first view of the Bay of Monterey lying in the 
golden sunlight in the embrace of the hills, a scene 
that no man seeing ever can forget. Onward he 



THE SPANISH ERA 145 

passed through the pines with the deep, haunting 
voice of the sea following him all the way. He knelt 
at the stations of the cross which had been erected 
on the road that was called the Road of Calvary. At 
the end of the fifth mile he was descending the oppo- 
site slope of the hill, the waters of the little Bay of 
Carmel were dancing in the distance, and suddenly 
he saw the bright river flowing to the sea and the 
Church of San Carlos de Carmel in its beauty rising 
from the emerald bosom of the upland. At the 
Mission a great host of Indian neophytes awaited 
him in gala attire and the bells rang out their sweet 
tones of welcome. With bared head the Governor 
entered the beautiful church, approached the altar 
and knelt above the ashes of Junipero Serra, Lasuen 
and Juan Crespi, the great-souled Franciscans who 
had wrested California from the darkness of heathen- 
ism and savagery. 

Although Sola's rule as Governor began so pleas- 
antly, the eight years of his administration were 
destined to prove unhappy for himself as well as for 
his King. Fate had reserved for Governor Sola the 
ignominious task of surrendering the power of Spain 
in California to the victorious revolutionists of Mex- 
ico. 

Sola's troubles began immediately. The Russians 
at Fort Ross and Bodega on the coast north of San 
Francisco were constant thorns in his side. The 
Muscovites appeared to be determined to colonize the 
northern portion of the Province as well as to use it 
for a hunting and a fishing-ground. The Governor 
received instructions to drive the Russians out of the 
country, and there is no doubt he would have made 
the attempt had not invasion from another quarter 
intervened. The best he could do was to send the 
Franciscans out to extend their line of Missions, re- 
sulting in the establishment of San Rafael and San 



146 CALIFORNIA 

Francisco de Solano at Sonoma, but it may be that 
his fears regarding the Russians were groundless. 
Certainly they did everything they could to show a 
spirit of friendship for the Spaniards. They were 
extremely deferential and courteous in all their acts 
and aided the Franciscans with contributions of both 
money and ornaments in the erection of the Mission 
at Sonoma. 

But the Spanish rulers and settlers of California 
could not get over their dislike and distrust of all 
strangers. When Alexander Kofkoff, the Russian 
officer in charge of affairs at Fort Ross, came down 
to San Francisco in 1815 to transact some business, 
Luis Antonio Arguello, the Comandante of San 
Francisco, wrote a bitter letter to Governor Sola 
against the Russians, saying that their presence in 
the country was an insult to the Spanish flag. And 
this same Arguello was the brother of the beautiful 
Concepcion whose troth had been plighted to Res- 
noff, the Russian, in other and happier days. 

In these times, however, the Spanish power be- 
lieved itself to be most seriously threatened by Mexi- 
can revolutionists and other revolutionists from 
South American countries who had thrown off the 
Spanish yoke. Every now and then these people 
would make their appearance in the harbor of Mon- 
terey and in other ports along the California coast. 
Added to this was the ever present fear of Yankee 
traders. The Governor made it his business to visit 
the various presidios, where he harangued the troops 
and strove as best he could to impress them with a 
proper sense of their duty in case the threatened 
dangers were realized. He went so far as to instruct 
all the people as to the course they were to pursue 
in the event of an invasion from any enemy whatso- 
ever. Non-combatants were instructed to retire to 
the interior immediately upon notice of attack, driv- 



THE SPANISH ERA 147 

ing the cattle and horses with them and carrying as 
much supplies as possible. The Spaniards knew 
they could not defend the coast against a strong at- 
tack because of the weakness of the defenses, but they 
believed they could still hold their ground by retir- 
ing to the interior and fighting from the vantage 
point of a superior knowledge of the country. 

In the latter part of the year 1818 the Spaniards 
of California found at their doors the trouble they 
so long had feared. Two privateers came into the 
harbor of Monterey demanding the surrender of the 
country. They were Buenos Ayres insurgents. 
Monterey refused to surrender and a battle took 
place. It was a good hot fight while it lasted, and 
it seems that both sides were whipped, for the Span- 
ish finally abandoned Monterey and retreated to 
the interior, while the enemy, rather bady hurt and 
crippled, put out to sea, never to return. The Span- 
iards then came back to Monterey and busied them- 
selves strengthening their fortifications that they 
might be the better prepared for a future attack. 

The Buenos Ayres privateersmen after their warm 
experiences at Monterey ran into Santa Barbara 
under a flag of truce. They promised the inhabi- 
tants there that they would go their way and not 
molest California again, but they did not keep their 
promise. Reaching San Pedro harbor, the Com- 
mander, a Frenchman named Bouchard, landed a 
number of his men whom he marched southward for 
the purpose of raiding the Mission San Juan Capis- 
trano. They were intercepted on the way by Ensign 
Santiago Arguello with thirty men from the presidio 
of San Diego and completely routed. On this occa- 
sion Father Luis Antonio Martinez greatly distin- 
guished himself. He appeared at the psychological 
moment at the head of thirty-five of the stoutest of 
the Indians of San Luis Obispo to aid Arguello. 



148 CALIFORNIA 

The invaders lost their courage, scurried for their 
ships and put out to sea as fast as sails could carry 
them. 

Things went on from bad to worse and California 
continued in a feverish state of excitement until the 
climax came in 1822 when the ship San Carlos ap- 
peared in the harbor of Monterey flying a flag of 
green, white and red with an eagle and a crown in 
the center — a strange flag, indeed, and too new to have 
found a place on the chart of national colors. The 
Comandante and the troops of Monterey prepared 
immediately to pour destruction on the heads of the 
strangers. Governor Sola, who had received private 
advices of the final success of the revolution in Mex- 
ico, issued a command that the strangers be allowed 
to land and convey whatever message they had to 
present. A boat manned by oarsmen gaily uniformed 
put off from the ship and landed their leader, who 
presented himself to the Comandante of Monterey 
and addressed him as follows: ''I am the Canon 
Augustin Fernandez de San Vicente. I have come 
from the Imperial Mexican Capital with dispatches 
directed to the Governor of this Province, Don Pablo 
Vicente de Sola. I demand to be conducted to his 
presence in the name of my Sovereign, the Liberator 
of Mexico, General Don Augustin de Iturbide." 

The hour when Spanish dominion in California was 
to end had come. Sola knew it well. His fortress 
was ready to fight, and to fight to the death, but the 
Governor fully realized how unnecessary and un- 
availing bloodshed would be. There was nothing to 
do but to accept the inevitable — nothing but to strike 
the colors. Assembling the people and the soldiers, 
Pablo Vicente de Sola, last of the King's men, ad- 
dressed them in solemn words. He told them what 
he knew to be the situation and advised them to ac- 
cept with him the authority of Mexico. The garrison 



THE SPANISH ERA 149 

murmured but finally submitted to the Governor's 
admonition. Tlie flag of Spain was hauled down, 
never to be raised again in California, and in its place 
was hoisted the tri-color of the new Empire of the 
South, where for a brief time Don Iturbide was sit- 
ting on his new throne. California now became a 
Province of Mexico, and the Spanish era, which had 
not been without great deeds and much honor, was 
irrevocably closed. 

The loss of California was doubtless considered 
among the least of the calamities which befell Spain 
when the days of evil were thick upon her. She did 
not then know, as now she knows, that when this 
great, golden stretch of a thousand miles of the Pa- 
cific Coast of America slipped from her grasp she 
had deep reason to mourn. She did not foresee the 
days that were to be when the alien and the stranger 
would wring from the shining streams and the sun- 
lit hills of California stupendous treasures of gold. 
She was not granted the vision of a California which 
was destined to be a greater country than Spain had 
itself ever been within her own confines. 

Yet, the Spain that once owned and dominated half 
the earth could not have held California indefinitely. 
Sooner or later it had to be that this brightest of 
jewels would fall from her crown. All that can be 
said is that had Spain known the wealth of Califor- 
nia she would have made a sterner effort to retain 
it in her possession. 

California can never be otherwise than proud of 
her history as a Spanish province. The Governors 
who ruled the territory during the Spanish era were 
invariably men of high moral characters, who car- 
ried out with conscientious energy the policy of the 
fatherland in a far distant and isolated part of the 
world. 

Nor was it a mistake of either judgment or policy 



150 CALIFORNIA 

that lost California to Spain whose scheme of con- 
quest and colonization was without a flaw. First, 
there were the Missions for the care and education 
of the Indians ; next came the presidios for the pro- 
tection of the country ; then the pueblos. Under this 
threefold system, California would ultimately have 
prospered and developed into a great and happy 
country as surely as it has now done under a different 
system and a different race of people. 

But, with the passing of Spanish dominion and 
authority in California, all that was Spanish did not 
disappear. Spain's language, her customs, the blood 
of her splendid people, her traditions and her religion 
still linger on the dusty highways and flame from the 
embers of the past to soften the asperities of modern 
thought and action. Nor can the day ever come when 
the memories of Spain wiU whoUy depart from the 
new, bright empire which Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo 
was the first to sight from the decks of his daring 
ships on that dim and distant morning of 1542. 



THE MEXICAN ERA 

VI 

What may be properly termed the Mexican era in 
the history of California began with the fall of Span- 
ish power on the North American continent in the 
year 1822, and ended with American domination in 
1846 — a period of twenty-five years. It was practi- 
cally an era of inactivity, distinguished by anything 
except commercial progress. On the other hand, in 
the romance of California, it was the greatest era 
of aU. 

Looking at California's Mexican era from one 
point of view, there is a feeling of regret in the heart 
that the color and the splendid, happy idleness of it 
ever passed away. Those were the days when people 
were not concerned with the strenuous materialism 
and commercialism of modern life. There was no 
greed, very little ambition and a great deal of peace. 
California was then a country of vast estates. The 
cattle roamed on the hills, the fertile soil was taxed 
only to a degree that would give sustenance to the 
population. There was plenty of running water for 
man and beast; the doors of the great Mission hos- 
pices were open with a welcome that was endless and 
without price to whoever might fare along El Camino 
Real. And the door of every man's house was open 
in the same way. There was marriage and giving 
in marriage, many children, much joy, little hate and 
a contentment that was as vast as the sun and moon 
and stars that shone upon the white peaks of the 
Sierras, the swinging lomas and the flower-flamed 
vales that stretched between Sonoma in the Valley 



152 CALIFORNIA 

of the Seven Moons and San Diego lying warm in the 
embrace of the dreamy hills that close in upon the 
Harbor of the Sun. 

During all those years California had no railroads, 
no bridges even, no telephones, no automobiles, no 
Boards of Trade and no intrusion from without ex- 
cept the visits of the Yankee traders who had 
rounded the Horn with New England merchandise 
to barter for the hides and tallow of the Missions, a 
Russian now and then from the north, an occasional 
American pioneer who had wandered through the 
mountain passes from the east, and may be a French- 
man or an Englishman once in a great while who 
came to see what might be seen — that was all. 

Of course this picture is a picture only of the 
greater portion of the Mexican era. Toward the 
latter years of this period a great change took place. 
This specter of American invasion caused California 
to become very uneasy in those latter days. It was also 
known that England certainly, and France, perhaps, 
were looking upon California with covetous eyes. 
The great Mission establishments were undergoing 
a process of destruction at the hands of greedy van- 
dals. Fremont was in the mountains, his presence 
in California being like a thorn in its side ; the ships 
of alien enemies were constantly seen off the sun- 
lit coast, a menace by day and their white sails at 
night like specters in a bad dream. 

How the Californians — for so the people were 
called by foreigners — lived and had their being in the 
day of the Mexican era, and what the great ranchos 
and the towns and pueblos were like constitute a 
colorful picture. The overlords of the Province 
were men of great standing, possessing unlimited 
means for hospitality and enjojrment. They gave 
great feasts and the marriages of their sons and 
daughters were attended by almost princely cere- 



THE MEXICAN ERA 158 

mony. All the people, high and low, were fond of 
dress and pleasure. Nobody seemed to have much 
if any actual money, but it was a poor man indeed 
who had not a good horse to ride. The pretty 
senorita who had not a satin shoe with which to trip 
a fantastic toe in the fandango was rare to find. 
There were no grand houses, and none were needed. 
It was from a little two-room, thatch-roofed dwell- 
ing that, as likely as not, would come the most richly 
attired girl or the most gorgeously clothed caballero. 

The Yankee trader who brought a shipload of silks 
and satins, purple and fine linen and jewelry to Cali- 
fornia found no trouble in quickly exchanging those 
things for the hides, the tallow and other products of 
California. All ships bringing merchandise to Cali- 
fornia were required to enter their cargoes with the 
customs officer at Monterey, but to defeat the custom 
laws was as customary in those days as it has been 
ever since. To lighten the burden of taxation in- 
genius gentlemen's agreements were formed, under 
the conditions of which ships from the Philippines 
and other portions of the Orient laden with mer- 
chandise would frequently put in at Santa Catalina 
or some of the harbors of nearby islands. The Yan- 
kee traders having entered their ships at Monterey 
and partially discharged their cargoes, would clan- 
destinely meet the ships from the Orient at the Island 
harbors, take on a substantial cargo and then pro- 
ceed with their trading as though their ships carried 
only the cargo which was entered at Monterey. 

It was in this way that the women of California 
were enabled to appear in the finery of Cathay. 

What the principal towns and pueblos of Califor- 
nia were like in the days of the Mexican era has been 
vividly and faithfully described in a famous book 
entitled ''Two Years Before the Mast," written by 
Richard Henry Dana, Jr., an undergraduate of Har- 



154 CALIFORNIA 

vard who shipped on the New England trading brig 
Pilgrim in the year 1835 as an ordinary seaman. 
Dana kept an accurate record of his visit to Califor- 
nia and his book became invaluable for the informa- 
tion it contained as well as fascinating for its pen 
pictures of the people and the country he visited. 

San Francisco was, in those days, the least im- 
portant of all the coast towns of California, which 
fact, more than any other, enables us to make a con- 
trast between the Mexican era and the era of the 
present. Here are Dana's own words: 

''It was in the winter of 1835-6 that the ship Alert 
[Dana had been transferred from the Pilgrim to the 
Alert] in the prosecution of her voyage for hides on 
the remote and almost unknown coast of California, 
floated into the vast solitudes of the Bay of San Fran- 
cisco. All around was the stillness of nature. One 
vessel, a Russian, lay at anchor there, but during our 
whole stay not a sail came or went. Our trade was 
with the remote Missions which sent hides to us in 
launches manned by their Indians. Our anchorage 
was between a small island called Yerba 3uena and 
a graveled beach in a little bight or cove of the same 
name, formed by two small projecting points. Be- 
yond, to the westward of the landing place, were 
dreary sand hills, with little grass to be seen and few 
trees, and beyond them higher hills, steep and barren, 
their sides gullied by the rains. Some five or six 
miles beyond the landing place, to the right, was a 
ruinous presidio and some three or four miles to 
the left was the Mission of Dolores, as ruinous as 
the presidio, almost deserted, with but few Indians 
attached to it and but little property in cattle. Over 
a region far beyond our sight there were no other 
human habitations, except that an enterprising Yan- 
kee, years in advance of his time, had put up on the 
rising ground above the landing a shanty of rough 



THE MEXICAN ERA 155 

boards where lie carried on a very small retail trade 
between the hide ships and the Indians. Vast banks 
of fog invading us from the North Pacific drove in 
through the entrance and covered the whole bay; 
and when they disappeared we saw a few well-wooded 
islands, the sand hills on the west, the grassy and 
wooded slopes on the east, and the vast stretch of the 
bay to the southward where we were told lay the Mis- 
sions of Santa Clara and San Jose, and still longer 
stretches to the northward and northeastward where 
we understood smaller bays spread out and large 
rivers poured in their tributes of waters. There were 
no settlements on these bays or rivers, and the few 
ranchos and Missions were remote and widely sepa- 
rated. Not only the neighborhood of our anchorage, 
but the entire region of the great bay, was a solitude. 
On the whole coast of California there was not a 
lighthouse, a beacon, or a buoy, and the charts were 
made up from old and disconnected surveys of Brit- 
ish, Russian, and Mexican voyagers. Birds of prey 
and passage swooped and dived about us, wild beasts 
ranged through the oak groves and, as we slowly 
floated out of the harbor with the tide, herds of deer 
came to the water's edge, on the northerly side of 
the entrance, to gaze at the strange spectacle." 

Time does not move with such leaden feet, after all. 
The child born in the desolation of Yerba Buena dur- 
ing the visit of Dana 's ship would not yet have passed 
very far beyond the prime of manhood to have beheld 
on that same spot one of the greatest cities of the 
world. Indeed, Dana himself, when he returned to 
San Francisco from New England, twenty-four years 
after his famous voyage before the mast, saw the little 
squalid pueblo which he described risen in that short 
span of time to the dignity of a world metropolis. 

The inland pueblos of San Jose and Los Angeles 
were not important during the Mexican era, neither 



156 CALIFORNIA 

were they of good repute. It appears that the popu- 
lation of both these slow-growing towns was com- 
posed of a class of men whose ambitions were limited 
and whose sense of morality was not such as to be 
held up as an example to be followed. There was 
little or no attempt at industry and far too much 
drinking and gambling going on for the general good. 
No man could have dreamed that the San Jose and 
the Los Angeles of the Mexican era would develop 
into the splendid world-famed cities that they are 
today. 

The coast pueblos, with the exception of San Fran- 
cisco, were naturally the more important settlements, 
cleaner and with a better class of people. Santa 
Cruz, with its dream of a great industrial city of 
Branciforte, had wholly faded away, nothing being 
left there but the remams of the Mission establish- 
ment. Santa Barbara was a town of about one hun- 
dred white-washed, red-roofed adobe houses, and the 
great Mission standing back on the commanding hiUs, 
a mighty landmark to the mariner then as it is to this 
day. San Diego was an important trading point — 
a town even larger then than Santa Barbara and 
perhaps more bustling. The Yankees liked San 
Diego then even as they like it now when they come 
to visit California. Owing to its fine natural harbor 
it was always believed that San Diego would grow 
to be an important place. 

Monterey, the Capital of California during the 
Mexican era, as it had been during the Spanish era, 
was the most important place in California. Dana 
gives a description of it in his book: **We came to 
anchor within two cable lengths of the shore," says 
he, **and the town lay directly before us, making a 
very pretty appearance; its houses being of white- 
washed adobe which gives a much better effect than 
those of Santa Barbara which are mostly of a lead 



THE MEXICAN ERA 157 

color. The red tiles, too, on the roofs, contrasted 
well with the white sides, and with the extreme green- 
ness of the lawn upon which the houses — about a hun- 
dred in number — were dotted about, here and there, 
irregularly. There are in this place, and in every 
other town which I saw in California, no streets nor 
fences (except that here and there a small patch might 
be fenced in for a garden), so that the houses are 
placed at random upon the green. This, as they are 
of one story, and of the cottage form, gives them a 
pretty effect when seen from a little distance. ' ' 

Dana said that it seemed to him that every man 
he met in California in those far-away days of 1835 
seemed to be on horseback, and he was struck by the 
beautj^ of the women and their love of dress, which 
latter statement merely proves that men and women 
in California were not different from their fellow 
human beings elsewhere in the world in those times 
or in any other time of which there is any record. 

They were also a soft-spoken and very engaging 
people from the viewpoint of Dana's keen observa- 
tion. ''Next to the love of dress," he says, "I was 
most struck with the fineness of the voices and beauty 
of intonation of both sexes. Every common ruffian- 
looking fellow, with a slouch hat, blanket cloak, dirty 
under-dress and soiled leather leggins, appeared to 
me to be speaking elegant Spanish. It was a pleas- 
ure to simply listen to the sound of the language, 
before I could attach any meaning to it. They have 
a good deal of the Creole drawl, but it is varied by 
an occasional extreme rapidity of utterance, in which 
they seem to skip from consonant to consonant, until, 
lighting upon a broad open vowel, they rest upon that 
to restore the balance of sound. The women carry 
this peculiarity of speaking to a much greater ex- 
treme than the men, who have more evenness and 
stateliness of utterance. A common bullock driver, 



158 CALIFORNIA 

on horseback, delivering a message, seems to speak 
like an ambassador at a royal audience." 

It was during the Mexican era and especially to- 
wards its close in 1846 that California was cut up 
into those vast estates which, could they have been 
held by the descendants of the grantees for another 
fifty years or less, would have enriched them all be- 
yond the dreams of avarice. It was these so-caUed 
Spanish grants and Mexican grants which formed 
the basis of later land titles, causing almost endless 
trouble to the American authorities when the United 
States Government came into possession of the 
coimtry. In many instances the titles overlapped 
and altogether the question was productive of great 
entanglements and an enormous amoimt of legal 
work. 

DuriQg the Spanish era only a few grants appear 
to have been made. In 1784 Governor Pedro Fages 
set aside for the sole use of Manuel Nieto a hugh slice 
of the present county of Los Angeles. He gave also 
in the same county 300,000 acres of land to one Santa 
Jose Maria Verdugo. The great bean ranches of 
Ventura county of the present day came originally 
into the possession of the Pico family in 1795, and 
miles upon miles of the coast northward from San 
Pedro were granted to Jose Dario Arguello about 
the same time. 

But it remained for the Mexican Governors to give 
away the lands of California with princely improvi- 
dence. If a man wanted land he made his applica- 
tion to the Governor and, if he were a man who stood 
well, his petition was granted without the difficulty 
of much ceremony. There was plenty of land, and as 
things were then it is doubtful that a man who wanted 
any land at all displayed good judgment. The more 
land he had the poorer he was, and the acquirement 
of an estate meant only the shouldering of respon- 



THE MEXICAN ERA 159 

sibility and the keeping up of grand appearances 
with little or nothing in the way of money on which 
to make good the display of wealth and power. 
Throughout all California can be found today many 
poor and humble families bearing great names who 
would now be immensely rich had it been possible for 
their progenitors and themselves to have held on to 
one-thousandth part of their original family posses- 
sions in real estate. 

As a type of these great overlords of the Mexican 
era a description of Don Antonio Maria Lugo may 
very well serve for all. His contemporaries were 
much like him in their personalities, the power they 
wielded and the extent of their estates. 

At the end of the nineteenth century there were 
men still living in California who remembered Lugo 
well, although even at that time a half century had 
passed since the day when, at a very old age, he lay 
down to his last sleep in the warm bosom of the little 
kingdom which was once all his own. 

Don Antonio Maria Lugo was in many respects a 
great man. He was a native Californian, born of 
Spanish parents in 1775 at the Mission San Antonio 
de Padua, which is still beautiful in ruin under Santa 
Lucia's peaks of glory. Doubtless the blessing of 
Junipero Serra himself was on Lugo's cradle, for the 
Mission San Antonio de Padua was singularly dear 
to Father Serra 's heart. 

When he was not much more than a boy, Lugo 
served valiantly in battle for the honor of Spain, in 
the days that he afterwards always referred to as 
**the good old days of the King. " It was for his ser- 
vices to the King that he was given a concession of 
lands in California in the year 1813. Seven leagues 
of land it was, watered by two rivers. Then, as chil- 
dren and grand-children grew, he was conceded more 
land, league by league. There was a time when he 



160 CALIFORNIA 

could ride for days and nights without touching foot 
on land that was not his own ; from San Bernardino 
under the shadow of the Great Arrowhead and the 
Mountains of Mystery, westward to where the ships 
of Cabrillo once rocked in the Harbor of San Pedro, 
through what is now Pasadena and Los Angeles, it 
was all Don Antonio's land with the exception of 
little specks of farms and pueblo gardens, here and 
there. 

A fine figure of a man was Don Antonio, six feet 
tall in his stockings, spare but sinewy, lithe and strong 
as a mountain lion, his hair black as the raven's wing, 
his jaw square cut and firm, his eyes dark as night, 
piercing yet gentle and easily moved to tenderness. 
He was a pure type of the noblest Spaniard. 

In all the Californias, Lugo was the best and most 
noted horseman, and that was saying a great deal in 
a land of horsemen. It is related that in 1846 when 
he had become an old man, he rode from Los Angeles 
to Monterey to pay a visit to his sister, the Dona 
Maria Antonia Lugo de Vallejo. They had been long 
absent, the one from the other. As he rode into Mon- 
terey with his two companions, Dona Maria was 
seated on the porch of her house, a considerable dis- 
tance away on an eminence which overlooked the city 
and the beautiful bay. As the horsemen came into 
view at a turn of the road. Dona Maria shaded her 
eyes, gazed long, and exclaimed, "There comes my 
brother ! " A young girl who sat beside the old lady 
answered her, saying, "O grandmother, yonder come 
three horsemen, it is true, but no one can tell who they 
are at that distance." Dona Maria replied, quickly, 
"But, girl, my old eyes are sharper than yours. That 
tall man in the middle is my brother whom I have not 
seen for twenty years. I know him by his seat in the 
saddle. No man in California rides like him. Hurry 
off, girl, call your mother and aunts, your brothers, 



THE MEXICAN ERA 161 

sisters and cousins, and let us go forth to welcome 
Mm." 

Notwithstanding that it was a part of Don Anto- 
nio's duties to assist in keeping the coast free of 
pirates, and that his sword and carbine were fre- 
quently called into play, he lived a long life. He 
had relations with all the Spanish governors of Cali- 
fornia except the first three, and he saw California 
pass under the rule of three flags. His descendants 
were and are still numerous, and wherever they are 
found today in either a high or a low estate, it is their 
proudest boast that his blood flows through their 
veins. 

The concessions of land granted to residents of Cal- 
ifornia by both the Spanish Governors and the Mexi- 
can Governors, and which were recognized and con- 
firmed by the United States, amounted all told to 
approximately nine million acres. There is a total 
area of one hundred million acres in California, so 
that these grants formed really a small part of the 
territory, especially in view of the fact that both 
Spain and Mexico regarded California as being of a 
much vaster extent than it is now known to be. 

It is to be remembered, further, that these grants 
embraced in many instances thousands of acres of 
mountain land which even to this day are non-pro- 
ductive. The grantees are not to be associated in the 
mind with the large land speculators who followed 
later and who profited by colonization schemes which 
enabled them to parcel out holdings at large profit. 
The chief iadustry of early days was stock-raising, 
and to accommodate the thousands of head of cattle 
it was thought desirable to acquire large tracts. 
Again, in those days it was the practice to make what 
is now considered large grants, because the value of 
the lands, intrinsically, was very small. Not only 
did the custom prevail in New Spain but in the east- 



162 CALIFORNIA 

ern portion of the United States, under the rule of 
England. 

From a commercial and political aspect the Mexi- 
can era of California is a record of wretchedness and 
decadence, and yet it began very promisingly, in spite 
of the foolish and self -destructive laws put in force 
by the Mexican Government. Luis Antonio Arguello, 
the first Mexican Governor of California, was a man 
of large mental capacity and excellent judgment who 
had the courage and the good sense to disregard the 
handicap with which the Government endeavored to 
hamper California. Had Arguello been allowed to re- 
main in power, California's commercial progress and 
her political dignity might not have suffered as it 
did. But ArgueUo was not allowed to remain very 
long in office and the Government afterward, through 
its representative, harassed him with such persist- 
ence that he took to drink and died a broken, disap- 
pointed man at the early age of forty-six years. He 
was buried in the churchyard of the Mission Dolores 
and a handsome marble tomb, still to be seen, was 
erected over his grave. 

Hides of cattle, tallow and otter skins formed 
nearly the whole basis of trade in California when 
Arguello came into power in 1822 — in November 
of that year. The hide and tallow products were 
derived almost wholly from the Mission establish- 
ments, while the trade in otter skins had drifted 
quite as wholly into the hands of the Russians at 
Bodega, Fort Ross and other points on the coast. 
Arguello made a bargain with the Russians by which 
they were to give the Government half the otter sldns 
secured. 

The Government in Mexico passed a law, or rather 
issued an edict, prohibiting California from conduct- 
ing any kind of trade whatever with foreigners. This 
law seemed to work great hardship on the Calif or- 



THE MEXICAN ERA 163 

niaris, who were much in need of cotton goods and 
other staples which they could secure only through 
American and other foreign trading ships arriving 
at California ports. Besides, what was to be done 
with the hides and tallow and other products of the 
Province if they could not be disposed of to foreign 
traders? At the very beginning of Mexican domi- 
nation in California this anti-trading law was de- 
signed to cripple the Province fatally and it would 
have done so had not Governor Arguello risen to the 
stature of greatness. 

In 1823 there were several American and English 
ships in the port of San Francisco endeavoring to 
trade with the Missions and it seems that, despite the 
prohibitory law. Father Payeras entered into a con- 
tract with William P. Hartnell, an English merchant, 
to sell him hides and other products for a period of 
three years. In a short time after this, John Rogers 
Cooper, owner and Captain of the schooner Rover, 
of Boston, arrived at the port of Monterey, ready to 
trade and to do business with the Calif ornians. Cap- 
tain Cooper became immediately informed of the 
existence of the law prohibiting him from entering 
into trade with the people of the Province, and in 
the hope that he might find some way around it, he 
promptly presented himself to Governor Arguello, 

Greatly to the satisfaction of the people, the Gov- 
ernor decided to disregard the anti-trading law and 
granted permission to Cooper to dispose of his cargo 
by trade or sale upon payment of a reasonable cus- 
tom duty. Afterward, Governor Arguello, weU 
pleased with Captain Cooper, entered into an agree- 
ment by which Cooper was to sail to China with a 
cargo of otter skins. This agreement Cooper carried 
out to the satisfaction of aU concerned. The Missions 
loaned Arguello the money to make Cooper's China 
voyage possible and when it appeared the voyage did 

- G .. 



164 CALIFORNIA 

not realize sufficient to pay back the debt in fuU, the 
padres cancelled the balance out of respect to Ar- 
guello and in recognition of his efforts for the good 
of the country. The next year, 1824, William A. 
Gale, an American, and William E. P. Hartnell, the 
English trader, established business houses, each man 
acting separately for himself and his firm at Mon- 
terey. These were the first mercantile institutions 
ever founded in California. They were very suc- 
cessful for many years afterwards. 

Another thing that happened for the good of Cali- 
fornia during the time of Arguello was the inter- 
marriage of Americans and Englishmen and some- 
times Russians with the native women of California 
— that is to say, with the women of Spanish descent 
connected with what might be called the aristocratic 
families. This was a good thing for California from 
every point of view. 

It is a great pity that Governor ArgueUo could not 
have been left to work out the destinies of the splen- 
did territory which had been committed to his care 
and guidance. Owing to his capacity for adminis- 
tration, his broad liberality of view and his general 
aU-around strength of character, he was able, while 
in power, to successfully cope with the many difficul- 
ties that afterward, when Arguello had been deposed, 
were immediately renewed with the result that Cali- 
fornia was made extremely wretched. 

While he was by no means a partisan of the Mis- 
sions, Arguello recognized their importance and rea- 
lized that the Franciscan establishments were the 
only institutions in existence which were able to keep 
alive a struggling commerce. He was friendly to 
the foreigners who came to the shores of his Prov- 
ince, and was particularly friendly with such of 
them as remained in the country and intermarried 



THE MEXICAN ERA 165 

with his people. If he had been left alone he would 
undoubtedly have built up a strong government in 
California, although it was threatened from without 
and from within by enemies. He had to face very 
bad conditions. The government in Mexico was 
puerile and rotten — a government which, instead of 
rendering assistance to the people of California, un- 
loaded upon them shipload after shipload of convicts 
and outlaws and the very scum of humanity. In 
addition to all this, the bad Indians of the Province 
became restive and formed a conspiracy to murder 
all the whites. 

One of the Indian uprisings with which Arguello 
dealt successfully was a really serious matter. The 
neophytes of Purisima and Santa Ynez Missions 
were the original conspirators who were soon able by 
means of couriers to assure themselves of the assist- 
ance of the Indians at San Luis Obispo, Santa Bar- 
bara, San Buenaventura and San Fernando. Every 
movement was conducted with remarkable and suc- 
cessful secrecy. Evidently the Indians had learned 
how to combine. 

The uprising was fixed to take place on the morn- 
ing of Sunday, February 22, 1824, while the white 
population was in churches attending Mass. But on 
the Saturday afternoon preceding, the Indians of 
Santa Ynez, finding themselves armed and painted 
and otherwise prepared to begin their murderous 
work, were too impatient to wait, and determined to 
commence at once with the murder of Father Uria, 
the Mission padre, who was, at the time, enjoying his 
siesta. But Uria was warned by a faithful little 
Indian boy. Springing from his couch, the padre 
seized a musket and, by a striking exhibition of 
marksmanship, shot three of the attacking party. 
Meanwhile the soldiers were aroused from their 



166 CALIFORNIA 

quarters and an additional small company of soldiers 
unexpectedly arrived on the ground. Thus the at- 
tack on Santa Ynez failed, though the Indians did 
much damage by setting the buildings on fire. The 
attack on Purisima also failed, though it was quite 
spirited; and it appears that there was considerable 
blood shed at the other Missions included in the up- 
rising. The news soon reached Governor Arguello, 
who sent out a little army of about a hundred men 
which promptly succeeded in inflicting summary 
punishment on the dusky insurrectos and reducing 
them to a state of total subjugation. 

It wiU thus be seen that Governor Arguello was 
rendering splendid service to the Province in every 
way, but his good work was cut short by the arrival 
at San Diego, on June 22, 1825, of Jose Maria de 
Echeandia, who had been appointed to succeed Ar- 
guello as Governor. The progress that had so prom- 
isingly begun was to be superseded by an administra- 
tion diametrically opposed to all of Arguello 's ideas. 
Governor Echeandia came to California determined 
to carry out both in letter and spirit the policy of 
Mexico towards foreigners. He determined to not 
only put an end to the trade with outsiders but to 
drive aU intruders peremptorily from the Province. 
And thereby hangs the tale of Captain Jedediah 
Smith, who brought with him into California the first 
party of Americans that ever came by the overland 
route. 

There is probably no greater hard luck story on 
the pages of any book than that which is furnished 
by the experiences of Captain Jedediah Smith and 
his party of trail-blazing traders. His historic trek 
out of the desolation of the land of the Great Salt 
Lake over mountains and through deserts, beating his 
precarious march through the passes of the Sierra 



THE MEXICAN ERA 167 

Madre down into San Diego and from thence north- 
ward out through the Sierra Nevada into Utah, from 
where he then started back again into California the 
way he came at first, his hardships, sufferings and 
trials outshine in their grim glory the memorable 
march of Juan de Anza, the famous Captain of 
Tubac, who first blazed the inland trail from Sonora 
to Monterey, in 1771. 

Captain Jedediah Smith, under license from the 
Government of the United States, had gone into the 
Rocky Mountain country with an organized expedi- 
tion of hunters and trappers of which he was in com- 
mand. In August of the year 1826, having drifted 
for many weeks to the southwestward over an un- 
mapped country and theretofore untrodden trails, 
they at length found themselves in the blazing desert 
near the Colorado River in desperate circmnstances 
and practically without subsistence. Both the men 
and the horses of the expedition were on the verge of 
starvation. 

In his predicament on the Colorado, Captain Smith 
learned that his party were within three hundred 
miles of the Mission San Gabriel, in California, and 
as it was fuUy five hundred miles back to his base of 
supplies at Salt Lake, he determined to make a des- 
perate attempt to reach San Gabriel, which he suc- 
ceeded in doing by a most terrible effort. When they 
flung themselves at last at the ever-welcoming doors 
of the old hospice of the Missions near Los Angeles, 
the entire party was pitifully exhausted. 

Doubtless it was the good padres at San Gabriel 
who conveyed to Captain Smith and his party the 
knowledge that they had come upon forbidden 
ground. Not desiring to bring greater troubles upon 
the heads of himself and his men, Captain Smith 
directed a respectfully worded letter to Governor 



168 CALIFORNIA 

Echeandia at San Diego in which the pathetic strait 
the expedition was in was duly set forth. The Gov- 
ernor immediately ordered Captain Smith to San 
Diego that he might give an account of himself. But 
his account when given was not believed by Eschean- 
dia, so that the Americans found themselves in a tight 
place at San Diego. Fortunately, however, the cap- 
tains of several American trading vessels in the Har- 
bor joined in a signed appeal to the Governor to 
allow them to furnish Captain Smith and his party 
with supplies in order that the expedition be per- 
mitted to peacefully depart. To this Governor 
Echeandia consented with the proviso that Smith 
and his men depart from California by exactly the 
same route over which they had entered. 

For what, no doubt, were good and sufficient rea- 
sons, Captain Smith did not obey the Governor's 
orders to leave California by the route over which he 
had entered. The horror of the waterless deserts of 
the Colorado was before him and he is not to be 
blamed for determining to avoid a renewal of that 
unpleasant acquaintance. The party passed San 
Gabriel, marched northward and entered the San 
Joaquin Valley from which they attempted to cross 
the Sierra Nevada, but they found that this could 
not be done. It was now January and the Sierras 
were blockaded with snow. Their attempt to cross 
the mountains resulted in the loss of a large number 
of horses, so they came back to the valley again, pass- 
ing onward through the great sun-swept solitudes, 
threading the passes of the hills that beckoned to 
them until they found themselves in the Valley of 
Santa Clara and camped near the Mission San Jose 
almost within view of the waters of San Francisco 
Bay. 

As has been stated, the Californians were at this 
time in such a state of mind that they viewed the 



THE MEXICAN ERA 169 

presence of foreigners, and particularly Americans, 
with the utmost suspicion and distrust. Nobody 
could have been more unwelcome than Captain Smith 
and his men, who really did not seem to be able to 
give a good account of themselves, notwithstanding 
they were simply hunters and trappers, wholly inno- 
cent of any wrong intention whatever, and who were, 
as a matter of fact, merely wanderers who had lost 
their way. But Smith learned that there was con- 
siderable commotion occasioned within the walls of 
the Mission San Jose as the result of the unexpected 
appearance of his party. 

To allay the fears of the people of the Mission, 
Captain Smith addressed a letter to the good Father 
Narcisco Duran, in which he set forth with an ap- 
pealing frankness and truthf uhiess his situation and 
the accident which brought about his presence at that 
g^^?,*- !'^,^^ a long ways from home, " said Captain 
bmith, m his touching message, ''and am anxious to 
get there as soon as the nature of the case will admit. 
Our situation is quite impleasant, being destitute of 
clothing and most of the necessaries of life at this 
tune, wild meat being our principal subsistence. I 
am, Reverend Father, your strange but real friend 
and Christian brother." 

This letter no doubt resulted in placing Captain 
Smith right with the padres at the Mission and pleas- 
ant relations were established. Otherwise Smith 
would not have determined to leave a portion of his 
party behind him at the Mission San Jose while he 
with some others marched away with the object of 
reaching Salt Lake, picking up the rest of his expe- 
dition there, returning with them to the Mission San 
Jose, and then proceeding northward to the Colum- 
bia River where it was thought a field for their trap- 
ping and hunting operations awaited them. 



170 CALIFORNIA 

Arriving at Salt Lake and gathering together the 
eighteen men, two women and horses that were there, 
he again struck out for California with the object of 
joining forces with those of his party whom he had 
left behind at Mission San Jose. His trip across the 
mountains had evidently convinced him of the im- 
practicability of recrossing them with his entire 
party, so he took the same route he had traveled be- 
fore and at length again found himself on the Colo- 
rado where he had been exactly a year previous. 
Here ten of his men and the two women were massa- 
cred by Indians and aU his horses killed or captured. 
Escaping the slaughter with eight of his men. Captain 
Smith set out on foot for San Bernardino. Arriving 
at that place he left two men there who had fallen 
sick and went down to San Diego with the others and 
secured passage in an American ship for San Fran- 
cisco, immediately putting out from that port for 
San Jose, where he had left his party. 

Although he threw himself upon the hospitality of 
the people of San Jose, the inhabitants were obsessed 
with the belief that the stranger was a hostile in- 
vader, heading a force of men whose object was to 
seize California. They threw the poor wanderer into 
jail. A second time he wrote to Governor Echeandia 
and he was ordered to Monterey where the Governor 
then was. Smith's reasons for a second appearance 
in California were demanded and he gave them, but 
they were unavailing and he was ordered back to 
prison. Heartsick and suffering as he was, the cap- 
tains of the ships at Monterey interceded for him as 
the other captains had done at San Diego, whereupon 
Governor Echeandia ordered him forthwith out of 
the country, refusing to allow his hunters to accom- 
pany him. Again did Captain Jedediah Smith turn 
his face to the wilderness, striking across the moun- 



THE MEXICAN ERA 171 

tains and, it is supposed, reaching the plains beyond. 
He was never heard of again. Probably the Indians 
killed him, or he may have died from thirst and 
hunger. 

Other Americans began now to filter through the 
mountain passes into California by the overland 
route, always to the distress of mind of the Califor- 
nians. They were thoroughly unwelcome. Nor 
were they the only visitors who came unbidden. 
Every now and then there was a strange sail on the 
sea manned by a captain and crews whom the Cali- 
fornians did not Like and whose motives were darkly 
suspected. 

As the story of Captain Jedediah Smith serves to 
illustrate the exasperation of the Calif ornians against 
the appearance of invaders by land, so does the visit 
of Captain Pedro Angulo serve to illustrate the har- 
assment that occurred from the sea. There were 
plenty of pirates preying on the shores of CaHfornia 
as there were marauding bandits inland, but it ap- 
pears that Angulo with his ship, the Aquila, was a 
detachment of a fighting fleet which had been whipped 
to a frazzle on the coast of Peru. Two other ships of 
the same fleet had arrived at Monterev and surren- 
dered to the Governor. This was in the time of 
Arguello. Captain Pedro Angulo had lagged behind 
and while the other ships were in Monterey he was 
sailing the Aquila into the roadstead of Santa Bar- 
bara. 

Wherever he got it, Angulo was in possession of a 
magnificent uniform, and it was in it that he placed 
himself, all bedecked with gold lace and ribbons and 
fine plumes for his hat. He caused himself to be put 
ashore and demanded from the awestricken but ad- 
miring proletariat of Santa Barbara to be led to the 
house of the Comandante. 



172 CALIFORNIA 

Now the Comandante of Santa Barbara at that 
time was the renowned Jose Antonio de la Guerra y 
Noriega, and, as it happened, there was a wedding at 
fuU swing within the walls of his casa at the fateful 
hour Pedro Angulo, arrayed as was no admiral be- 
fore, thundered for admittance at the oaken door of 
the Comandante. Within, all was music and light and 
feasting. A daughter of the house had just been 
solemnly wed by a padre of the old Mission to Wil- 
liam E. P. Hartnell, the English trader who had 
lately become a citizen of California. The music 
suddenly stopped and the great dark eyes of the 
seSoritas opened wider, the gallant caballeros stood 
rooted to the floor and it may be that the padres 
piously crossed themselves. There could be no ques- 
tion that Captain Pedro Angulo had created great 
astonishment in his glittering uniform. 

As soon as the assemblage could recover, the visi- 
tor was invited to enjoy the traditional hospitality 
of an illustrious house. Captain Pedro growled in 
reply that he wanted no hospitality and that he 
couldn't speak anything but French anyway. At 
this, the bridegroom addressed this gorgeously ar- 
rayed seafaring creature in the tongue of his pref- 
erence. It was then discovered that he preferred 
not to speak even in the language of his choice. It 
is said that he turned contemptuously on his heel, 
strode from the house and returned to his ship. Order- 
ing all sails spread, he stood out to sea, but just before 
he left the harbor the cannon from his deck spat out 
a flame of fire and the ball from its iron throat went 
crashing through the Presidio of Santa Barbara. 
And that was the last that was heard of Pedro Angulo 
save for the rumor that he had sailed back for South 
America and had surrendered himself at Valparaiso. 

While on the subject of weddings, the records of 
the old Mexican days teemed with great memories of 



THE MEXICAN ERA 173 

wonderful celebrations of this character. What was 
perhaps the most celebrated wedding that ever oc- 
curred in California took place in the time and the 
reign of Echeandia. It was a double wedding, bind- 
ing in wedlock Augustin Zamorano, the Governor's 
secretary, to Luisa, the daughter of Santiago Ar- 
guello, and of Romualdo Pacheco to Romona, daugh- 
ter of Joaquin Parrillo. This famous double wed- 
ding took place at San Diego, the young men and 
their brides being alike eminent for their aristocratic 
birth, wealth and good looks. 

Upon conclusion of the marriage ceremony and a 
great feast at San Diego at which the entire popu- 
lation turned out, a bridal tour to Monterey was 
begun. The Governor and his entourage, accompa- 
nied by a military escort, traveled with the wedding 
party, word of the movements of which was carried 
ahead by courier from rancho to rancho and from 
Mission to Mission across the hills and through the 
valleys and along all the stretches of the shores of 
the sunset ocean. The beauty and the high social 
standing of the brides with their distinguished, hand- 
some husbands, coupled with the great honors paid 
to them by the Governor's court, aroused all the 
spirit of romance that was so rife in California in 
those pleasure-loving days. At every point along the 
sun-swept leagues of the King's Highway where any 
sort of establishment existed, a bridal feast and all 
manner of carnival for the happy travelers was in 
waiting. There had been many another wedding in 
California before this and there has been many an- 
other since, but never one to equal the wedding of 
Zamorano and Pacheco to the dark-eyed, lovely 
daughters of Santiago Arguello and Joaquin Par- 
rillo. 

But there was a sad sequel to this wedding, at least 
so far as Romualdo Pacheco was concerned. Some 



^l 



174 CALIFORNIA 

years afterward, in the time of Manuel Victoria, the 
fourth Mexican Governor of California, this hot- 
headed and tyrannical ruler found himself face to 
face with a serious insurrection against his govern- 
ment. The cause of the revolt was Victoria 's refusal 
to call together the territorial deputation or council, 
which was a matter obligator}^ upon him under the 
law. The people murmured and, finally, in Novem- 
ber, 1831, the insurrection assiuned tangible propor- 
tions. 

A movement of revolt was commenced in San Diego 
by the issuance of a pronunciamento signed by Pio 
Pico, Juan Bandini and Jose Antonio CarriUo, in 
which it was set forth that they were loyal to the 
supreme government in Mexico "but that they felt 
themselves obliged to rise against the tyrant, whose 
criminal abuses of power had become intolerable. 
God, who knew their hearts, knew that they did so 
with pure intentions ; that it was love of country and 
respect for the laws which actuated them ; that they 
took up arms in behalf of justice and public right; 
that it was not against the Government or any of its 
institutions that they demanded redress; but only 
against the individual, Manuel Victoria, who under 
cover of his high office had violated almost every 
principle of the fundamental basis upon which the 
government rested. He had attempted to suppress 
the Territorial Deputation, destroy popular repre- 
sentation and establish absoluteism; he had sup- 
pressed the Ayuntamiento of Santa Barbara ; he had 
inflicted capital punishment in cases not warranted 
by the laws; he had arbitrarily and without justifi- 
cation expatriated Jose Antonio Carrillo and Abel 
Stearns and committed many other offenses, treating 
legal proofs and representations which were in any 
respect opposed to his own arbitrary will with dis- 
respect and contempt; he had jeopardized the peace 



THE MEXICAN EEA 175 

and tranquillity of the country and the person and 
property of all its citizens." 

If all this were true there would seem to be no 
doubt that Governor Victoria was a rather powerful 
political machine in himself and that folks who were 
not his friends were not likely to enjoy themselves 
to any extent by a continued residence in California. 
It is true enough that the man was a tyrant and 
totally unfitted by temperament to occupy the office 
of Governor. The insurrectionists demanded that 
he be deposed from his office of Comandante-General, 
political chief and Governor of the Territory. They 
also, of course, made a demand for the immediate 
convocation of the Territorial Deputation. 

The insurrectionists succeeded in inducing the 
troops at the presidio of San Diego to join the revolt. 
Echeandia, the former Governor, was proclaimed to 
supersede Victoria, and at the beginning of Decem- 
ber, Pablo de FortiUa, Comandante of the presidio 
of San Diego, marched to Los Angeles with thirty 
soldiers for the purpose of throwing Victoria out of 
office. The Alcalde at Los Angeles was opposed to 
the revolt, but the people of the pueblo were in favor 
of it. Fortilla gathered new recruits into his army 
at Los Angeles until he was able to put himself at 
the head of an armed force of two hundred men. In 
the meantime Governor Victoria had become in- 
formed of the revolt and attended only by a force 
that might be designated as a corporal's guard, 
he left the capital and marched southward in the full 
belief that his mere appearance at Los Angeles would 
result in the dispersing of the insurrectos. On his 
way down the Governor picked up thirty additional 
men at Santa Barbara whom he placed under com- 
mand of Captain Eomualdo Pacheco, one of the 
happy bridegrooms of that famous wedding journey 



176 CALIFOENIA 

of a few years before, over wMcli all California had 
been en fete. 

The insurrectionists, with Fortilla their comman- 
der in the saddle, marched out to a hill at the out- 
skirts of Los Angeles and there intercepted the Gov- 
ernor with his Httle force of men under Captain 
Pacheco. The insurrectionist leader tried to avoid 
a fight, if for no other reason that the conflict would 
be so unequal, and Captain Pacheco also realized that 
he stood no chance of victory by opposing his thirty 
men against the two hundred soldiers of Fortilla. 
Pacheco begged Governor Victoria to retire to San 
Pernando in the hope of reinforcement. 

Governor Victoria, however, was no coward, what- 
ever else he may have been. He flew into a violent 
temper and ordered Captain Pacheco to attack the 
rebels and disperse them or stand accused of fear. 
Pacheco 's blood grew hot at this and he ordered a 
charge which he himself led. In an instant the Cap- 
tain's horse and the horse of Jose Maria Avila, an 
insurrectionist, were breast to breast and it was 
Pacheco 's sword against Avila 's lance. Avila warded 
off the blow of Pacheco 's saber, drew his pistol and 
shot the gallant young Captain dead. Lifeless and 
bloody in the dust of El Camino Real, where but a 
few years before he had passed happy and feasting 
with his lovely bride, poor Romualdo was picked up, 
never to be glad again. 

But the battle went on fast and furious, and, 
strange as it may seem, Victoria was the victor. His 
very fury and his great prowess in the battle fright- 
ened the rebels. They broke and fled. Victoria was 
carried to the Mission San Gabriel, nearby, terribly 
wounded. His life was saved only by the fortunate 
presence at the Mission of an English surgeon. The 
Governor's life hung as by a thread for many weeks. 
Upon his recovery he decided that he had had quite 



THE MEXICAN ERA 177 

enough of the strenuous life in California. He abdi- 
cated and delivered over the government to Echean- 
dia and retired to Mexico, but his retirement was of 
his own free will and not at the dictation of his 
enemies. Overbearing and tyrannical he was, but no 
man was ever braver. As the ghosts of the old 
swash-bucklers of the past stand on California's 
haunted hills imder the dim stars of summer nights, 
Manuel Victoria takes his place at their head as the 
Captain of them all. 

Insurrections of the character of the one just de- 
scribed were frequent enough in California during 
the Mexican era, but many of them were without 
importance except as they indicated the turbulent 
state of the people. Perhaps the most important 
revolt of all was the one organized by the Carrillos 
against the government of Juan Batista Alvarado. 
The trouble lay in the fact that what was called the 
*' Supreme Government" in Mexico was as unstable, 
or even more so, as the government of Califor- 
nia. There were revolutions and new Presidents, 
Dictators and Emperors following one another with 
great rapidity in Mexico in those days. California 
had great difficulty in knowing just to whom its alle- 
giance was due. The scheme of government was that 
California should send a delegate to the Mexican 
Congress, but that the Governors of California should 
always serve under appointment of the Supreme 
Government. 

For a period of six years beginning with Decem- 
ber, 1836, the Governor of California was Juan 
Batista Alvarado, a man of parts. As in the case 
of every man of strong character and positive nature, 
bitter enemies as weU as loyal friends rose up about 
him. It was in Alvarado 's time, mainly, that we 
begin to hear a good deal about the Picos, Jose Cas- 
tro, Mariana Guadalupe VaUejo and other men whose 



178 CALIFORNIA 

names are still famed in California, some of whom 
were friends and some enemies of Alvarado. 

In 1837 Jose Antonio CarriUo, who had been a dele- 
gate to the Mexican Congress from California, man- 
aged to secure the appointment of his brother, Carlos 
Antonio Carrillo, as Governor, from the then Presi- 
dent of Mexico, who held sway imder the eloquent 
if not euphonious name of Bustamante. The Car- 
rillos did all in their power to wheedle Alvarado into 
an acceptance of a successor in office, but he refused 
to acquiesce. It was not that he would not have been 
glad to acquiesce in any lawful procedure which 
would have been for the good of California, for he 
was a man who had the interest of the Province at 
heart. But he had no faith in the Carrillos. He 
knew them to be malcontents who were forever schem- 
ing in their own selfish interests. He knew that they 
were hand in glove with Pio Pico and Andres Pico 
in every manner of mean and underhanded work and 
that they were especially active in efforts to forward 
the pet scheme of Pio Pico to move the Capital from 
Monterey to Los Angeles. The reason that Pio Pico 
wanted the Capital removed to Los Angeles was sim- 
ply that it would put money in his pocket. Neither in 
this nor in any of his other acts was he actuated by 
purely patriotic motives. He was for Pico first and 
California afterwards. In all the history of Califor- 
nia there is no name with a falser ring than the name 
of Pio Pico, and yet the man's memory has been made 
much of and attempts have even been made to glo- 
rify him. 

It seems that the Carrillos determined to oust 
Alvarado from office. They made an appeal to their 
adherents and actually resorted to arms. They 
stirred up sectional feeling. Every once in a while, 
even now, some fervid orator or vivid writer revives 
the proposition to cut California in two. Juan Ban- 



THE MEXICAN ERA 179 

dim, Ensign Macedonio Gonzalez, the redoubtable 
Captain Pablo de la Portilla and others in the south 
promptly arrayed themselves under the Carrillo 
colors. Andres Pico, forgetting for the nonce the 
traditional craftiness of his family, publicly espoused 
the Carrillo cause, but it seems that Pio Pico was wise 
enough to express no opinion one way or the other. 
The fox is always wary. 

The moment Governor Alvarado got wind of the 
revolution in the south he acted with characteristic 
promptness and force and it was during this episode 
that we first begin to take notice of General Jose 
Castro, whose name is immortal in the annals of 
California. Castro was Alvarado 's friend and, upon 
notification, he at once placed himself at the head of 
a military detachment and marched south from Mon- 
terey to bring the Carrillo conspiracy to an end. He 
passed through the Eincon, dragging the Spanish 
cannon after him. At the dawn of a morning soon 
afterwards his eight-pounder was trained on the 
camp of the insurrecto outposts at San Buenaven- 
tura. For two days the opposing forces fired num- 
berless shots at each other, whereupon the revolu- 
tionists fled. Happily, only one man was killed and 
it does not appear that any others were seriously 
hurt. Castro then marched to San Fernando where 
he was later joined by Alvarado himself, accom- 
panied by reinforcements. They discovered that 
Carrillo and his fellow conspirators had retreated to 
San Diego for the purpose of reinforcing their army. 
Leaving Castro to keep his eye on Los Angeles, Al- 
varado immediately set forth with his forces for San 
Diego to beard the lion in his den, or rather to scotch 
the snake in his hole. 

Alvarado learned on the way that Carrillo with his 
forces was returning northward to give battle. 
Reaching the Indian pueblo Los Flores, near San 



180 CALIFORNIA 

Juan Capistrano, Alvarado planted his forces on a 
hill. The revolutionists soon appeared. Alvarado 
opened a terrific fire upon them. Carrillo, the leader, 
promptly turned tail and ran away as fast as his legs 
could carry him. Left without a leader, his troops 
surrendered. Governor Alvarado was very kind to 
them, telling them to go home and to keep clear of 
conspirators in the future. Carrillo was afterwards 
permitted to return to his home at San Buenaven- 
tura, where he was allowed to remain undisturbed on 
the promise of his wife that she would see to it that 
he stirred up no more devilment. Thus ended the 
war against Alvarado. 

Sleeping in the sun, lonely but lovely, near beauti- 
ful San Juan Capistrano, lies the famous battlefield 
of Los Flores. It is a battlefield undrenched and 
unstained by human blood, and yet it was the scene 
of an important if not a fateful event. 

In the meantime Castro had captured the brother 
of Carrillo, Andres Pico, Jose Ramirez, Ignacio 
Palomares and other leaders of the insurrection. 
Alvarado sent them for safe-keeping to General Yal- 
lejo at Sonoma, remarking as he did so that "if he 
sent them to the devil, they would not get what they 
deserved, and he therefore sent them to Vallejo." 
And it appears to be true enough that while Vallejo 
kept out of the fight until the fight was won, he was 
now very eager to secure the good will of Alvarado 
by making it hard for the Governor's enemies who 
were in his hands. He refused to speak to the pris- 
oners and starved them as much as he dared without 
causing their death. He counseled Alvarado to exile 
them from the country. 

The name of General Mariano Guadalupe VaUejo, 
very famed in California, is another name like that 
of Pio Pico, around which there clings a glamor as 



THE MEXICAN ERA 181 

false as it is unwarranted. Yallejo was a trimmer, 
pure and simple, always trying to play safe. 

The reputation which he acquired for cruelty and 
which doubtless incited Governor Alvarado to say 
that the next best thing to sending prisoners to the 
devil was to send them to Vallejo, arose from an 
infamous incident when Vallejo was an ensign at 
Monterey. It was in the time of Governor Echean- 
dia, in the spring of the year 1829. There had been 
a revolt of neophyte Indians connected with the Mis- 
sions of San Jose and Santa Clara. They had forti- 
fied themselves near the San Joaquin River and had 
successfully repelled an attack of troops imder Ser- 
geant Antonio Soto. It was then that a hundred 
men were sent out from the presidio of Monterey 
under VaUejo's command. This force was consid- 
erably augmented by recruits picked up from San 
Francisco and San Jose. The Indian forces were 
vigorously attacked, falling under a terrific fire of 
musketry and cannon, notwithstanding that they 
made a valorous and heroic defense. It was then 
that the most cowardly, the most barbarous and the 
most murderous butchery in the history of California 
took place at the hands of VaUejo's forces. The In- 
dian auxiliaries that had fought in VaUejo's ranks 
against their own people, were formed in a circle and 
the captured Indians were sent into that circle, one 
after another, to be used as targets. It was great 
sport for Vallejo and his men. Nothing more cruel 
can be imagined. Other Indian prisoners were hung 
to trees with grapevines and the women were shot in 
cold blood. For this awful act of barbarity. Father 
Duran, who was then President of the Missions, did 
aU in his power to have VaUejo prosecuted, but his 
efforts were in vain. It is a stain on CaUfornia's 
escutcheon that the Government did not accede to 
Father Duran 's petition and by some condign pun- 



182 CALIFORNIA 

ishment make a public example of Vallejo, whose 
brutish and savage deed deserved punishment if ever 
deed deserved it. 

Of a piece with this most horrible outrage was the 
massacre of the Indians committed by General Val- 
lejo 's brother, Salvador Vallejo, at Clear Lake, in 
the spring of 1843. It was in the time of Governor 
Micheltorena. An account of it was given by a man 
named Bendeleven to the Surveyor General of the 
United States. From this letter Theodore Hittell, 
the historian, transcribed an account of the massacre 
as follows : 

''It seems that a cow had been stolen in the neigh- 
borhood of Sonoma in the Spring of 1843 and that 
Vallejo fitted out an expedition consisting of a num- 
ber of white men and Sonoma Indians which he 
placed under the command of his brother Salvador. 
What instructions were given does not appear; and 
it is probable that they acted without any. Be this 
as it may, they proceeded northward over valley and 
mountain and doubtless far beyond the limits of any 
rancheria that could have committed the theft, until 
they arrived at Clear Lake. Near the southern mar- 
gin of that magnificent sheet of water there are sev- 
eral islands of great beauty, two of which, in par- 
ticular, were inhabited by Indians who are said to 
have been of gentle disposition and who lived there, 
protected by their isolated situation, in fancied 
security. 

"When Salvador and his party arrived at the 
border of the lake, the chief Indians of the Island 
passed over on their rafts to meet and communicate 
with them. The newcomers said, through an inter- 
preter, that they had come on a peaceful mission, 
with the object of making an alliance, and requested 
to be carried over to one of the islands, where they 
should all meet. The natives, not for an instant sus- 



THE MEXICAN ERA 183 

pecting treachery, readily complied. When they 
were all collected at the main rancheria, the Indians, 
under pretense of the treaty, were induced to lay 
aside their weapons and enter their large under- 
ground temescal or sweat-house. When they had 
done so, the whites and their auxiliaries drew their 
knives, such as were used for slaughtering cattle, 
and throwing themselves into the gloomy pen, began 
a horrid and indiscriminate butchery, respecting 
neither age, condition or sex. 

**A few of the doomed creatures succeeded in 
breaking out of the gory inclosure and, plunging into 
the water, tried to escape by swimming to the main- 
land; but they were all shot to death as they were 
thus desperately endeavoring to get away — all, with 
apparently one single exception. Among them was 
a woman with a child tied in a net on her shoulders. 
As she sank, struck by a musket ball, the child strug- 
gled in its net, when one of the whites, either less bar- 
barous than the others, or more probably with an 
idea of securing a domestic servant, jumped on a raft 
and saved the half -suffocated infant. The narrator 
of the bloody story adds that he had seen the child, 
which was about a year old, and that whenever a 
white person approached it would utter a scream 
and go into convulsions of terror. And well it might ! 
And well might the narrator exclaim, as he did : ' Que 
barbaria! que ferocidad tan! de unos hombres des- 
tituidos de todo sentimiento de hinnanidad!' ('What 
barbarity! and what ferocity, too, of men destitute 
of every sentiment of humanity ! ') " 

From this it is clear that the garrison which Gen. 
Vallejo maintained at Sonoma on the frontier did 
not lack for good sport. 

And it would also appear that the Picos in the 
iouth were quite as eager to have a hand in the same 
bloody game. No doubt it appealed particularly to 



184 CALIFORNIA 

the Picos because murdering Indians, as well as 
robbing them, was a pastime that could be pursued 
with nttle danger. The first act of Pio Pico when 
he became Governor of California in 1845 was 
to enter into a contract with two Americans, John 
Marsh and John Gantt, for the slaughter of Indians. 
Pico agreed to compensate the Americans with five 
himdred cattle and one-half of all the horses they 
could take from the Indians. 

There were other minor exhibitions of cruelty 
against the Indians of those times, but with the ex- 
ception of the two massacres just related, the Indians 
suffered more from petty persecutions and the loss 
of their property than in any other way. The Mexi- 
can Era was an era of unrest, conspiracy, insurrec- 
tion, revolt and numerous quite bloodless battles on 
the one hand, and of feasting, dancing, marriage and 
giving in marriage on the other hand. Looking back 
upon that time it would seem that the happiness far 
outweighed the sorrow, and that amid all the in- 
trigues, the firing of guns and crashing of swords, 
there was much gladness. 

Not counting Sola, who served as a Mexican Gov- 
ernor for seven months after independence, ten men 
in all held the office of Governor in California during 
the Mexican era. They were as follows : 

Luis Arguello, 1823-25; Jose Maria Echeandia, 
1825-31; Manuel Victoria, 1831-32; Pio Pico, 1832- 
33, and again from February 22 to August 10, 1846 ; 
Jose Figueroa, 1833-35 ; Jose Castro, 1835-36 ; Nicolas 
Gutierrez, 1836; Mariano Chico, 1836; Juan Batista 
Alvarado, 1836-42; Manuel Micheltorena, 1842-45. 
It will thus be seen that Pio Pico, who served for the 
second time in 1846 was the last Mexican Governor 
of California. After long scheming, Pico had become 
legally the ruler of the Province, but the thunders 
were rumbling around his head and it was during his 



THE IMEXICAN ERA 185 

administration that Latin- American domination of 
California met its end. 

The situation was that England, France and the 
United States were each waiting their chance to 
grab California. Pico was the civil Governor, but 
General Jose Castro was the military head of the 
Province. There was a bitter quarrel between Pico 
and Castro. When Castro saw that dissension only 
added to the weakness of California, and that in or- 
der to repel whatever enemies might attempt to seize 
the country it was necessary for all factions to unite, 
the old warrior pocketed his pride and begged Pico 
to stand with him in the country's conunon cause 
against the invasion of its foes. 

The third prominent figure in California affairs 
at this crisis was Vallejo of Sonoma. Believing that 
the fall of California was inevitable Vallejo, true to 
his instincts, took steps to ingratiate himself with 
the United States, which power he believed would 
prove victorious at the game that was being played. 
Pico took another view of the matter and did what 
he could to ingratiate himself with the powers that 
he thought would prove victorious, namely, France 
or England. The only man that stood out clear and 
brave and ready to die in the last ditch, against whom- 
soever appeared as an invader, was Jose Castro. 
While Pico and Vallejo were juggling, Castro pre- 
pared to fight, and he did fight like the soldier that 
he was. 

On June 14, 1846, the Bear Flag of the California 
Republic was raised at Sonoma, and on July 7 of 
the same year the American flag was raised at Mon- 
terey. Vallejo was an easily taken prisoner at Fort 
Sutter and Pio Pico ran away. 

This was the end of Pio Pico's power and the end 
of Mexican rule in California. The death knell of 
Latin power in the Province was really soimded when 



186 CALIFORNIA 

William B. Ide issued Ms proclamation at Sonoma 
and the flag of the Grizzly Bear was hoisted on its 
swaying staff under the peaks of the Seven Moons. 
The end of Latin power and authority, however, did 
not mean that California was soon, if ever, wholly to 
abandon the traditions which the first conquerors 
and colonizers had impressed upon her soil and her 
history. Spanish and Mexican speech and thought 
were destined long to linger as, indeed, they linger 
still. It is to be hoped that at least the poetry, the 
romance and much else that was sweet and aUurtng 
in the life of a people who were so great in so many 
ways will not entirely disappear. 




THE BEAR FLAG MONUMENT 
{Plaza of Sonoma) 



VII 

THE BEAR FLAG REPUBLIC 

Unique in the history of the world is the true story 
of The Bear Flag Republic in California. Prom 
June 14, 1846, until the ninth day of the succeeding 
month of July, a period of twenty-six days, there ex- 
isted in California what was, to all intents and pur- 
poses, a separate and distinct nation with a republican 
form of Government and a flag of its own emblazoned 
with a lone star and a painted image of a Grizzly 
bear. The official name of the Government was **The 
Republic of California," but it is popularly known 
as ''The Bear Flag Republic." The new nation was 
established by an armed force consisting of twenty- 
four, men, and the entire history of the affair, short 
but vivid as it is, probably stands without parallel. 

There is no chapter in the history of California 
that has a more familiar sound to the ear than the 
chapter of this "Bear Flag Republic," yet the truth 
concerning it, not to speak of its intensely interesting 
details, is only vaguely familiar to most people. There 
is a great deal of misinformation extant in the minds 
of all except careful students and the historians 
themselves, concerning a good deal that appertains 
to the history of California, including both the stir- 
ring chronicles of the Argonauts and the Missions, 
but it is when we come to the chronicle of The Bear 
Flag Republic that we find, perhaps, not so much 
misinformation as the lack of information altogether. 
Everybody who lives in California and those who 
come to visit it, as well as those who read of it at a 
distance, have heard and know that there was once 



188 CALIFORNIA 

an uprising in which some Americans took part by 
raising a "bear flag" at Sonoma, following which 
there was more or less fighting with the native Cali- 
fornians. But that is about as far as the general 
information goes. 

Moreover, it is found that among those who pre- 
sume to be informed intelligently and as fully as may 
be on this famous episode in California's history, that 
there is considerable dispute as to the real facts. The 
subject has been the theme of endless controversies. 
The descendants of the Mexicans who were known as 
"CaHfornians" at the time of The Bear Flag Re- 
public say that the coup was merely a foray on the 
part of crude and irresponsible ruffians who had no 
high motive in view and who accomplished nothing 
by actions which they can call by no better name than 
depredations. On the other hand, the descendants 
of the early American settlers claim a high place in 
history for The Bear Flag Republic, and they cele- 
brate each recurring anniversary of its establishment 
with much oratory, music and the firing of military 
salutes. 

The purpose of this chapter in the present work is 
to teU the story as it occurred, without prejudice one 
way or the other, and to equip the reader with a clear 
and lucid understanding of this little, yet colorful 
and, in some ways, really important epoch in Cali- 
fornia's history. 

The episode of The Bear Flag Republic occurred 
in the summer of the year 1846 and it is essential in 
advance that conditions in California as they existed 
at that time be clearly understood. 

The dawn of the year 1846 found CaHfomia stiU 
a Province of the Republic of Mexico, with a white 
population of about ten thousand souls, all told. In- 
cluded in this population there had come to be a con- 
siderable sprinkling of Americans, who were engaged 



THE BEAR FLAG REPUBLIC 189 

in agricultural pursuits, lumbering and various kinds 
of trading. It is to be remembered that gold bad 
not yet been discovered, except as note may be taken 
of tbe unimportant discoveries made in the south, nor 
was there then, in the minds of the people, any 
thought whatever of the possibilities of the existence 
of gold. The Americans who had drifted in from 
''The States" came sometimes as sailors, deserting 
their ships in the lure of the country, or they were 
men who had crossed the plains and the mountains 
to the east and the north merely in search of undis- 
covered regions. But however it was that they came, 
they were enamored of California and had neither 
thought nor desire to abandon it. 

At this time the affairs of California as a Mexican 
province were in a very deplorable condition, indeed. 
Don Pio Pico was the Civil Governor, with his resi- 
dence near Los Angeles. He seemed to have avoided 
Monterey, which was still the capital of the Province 
as it had been from the first settlement in 1769. The 
military authority was vested in Don Jose Castro, 
who held power under the title of Comandante Gen- 
eral, his rank in the army being Lieutenant-Colonel 
of Cavalry. These two men were constantly at rival- 
ry, scarcely ever agreeing upon questions of govern- 
ment or authority, and constantly squabbling over a 
division of an exchequer which was usually little bet- 
ter than impoverished. Pico, after the secularization 
and spoliation of the Mission establishments and es- 
tates, found himself with no other means of easy rev- 
enues, while Castro, as the head of the military es- 
tablishments of the Province, would have found him- 
self put to his wit's end to mobilize an army consist- 
ing of more than one hundred men. 

It was plain to the Californians, as well as to the 
Americans and everybody else who were in the Prov- 
ince, that the Republic of Mexico was on its last legs, 



190 CALIFORNIA 

at least as far as holding possession of California was 
concerned. Both Pico and Castro appealed in vain, 
time after time, to the home government to strengthen 
their hands. It became at last fully apparent that 
Mexico was to lose California. 

For a time Governor Pico and others indulged 
themselves in the vain hope that they might be able 
to set up an independent Government, with them- 
selves at its head. Apparently, however, these hopes 
were soon abandoned and they settled down to the 
belief that either England, France or the United 
States would ultimately secure possession of Cali- 
fornia. Of these three possibilities, all regarded as 
evil by the CaUfornians, American domination was 
the most distasteful alternative. There were many 
who would have welcomed the power of France, but 
the majority seemed to stand most in favor of Eng- 
land; among these was Pico. 

Every day the air was filled with rumors and the 
people were constantly in a state of nervous excite- 
ment and discontent. That England was actively en- 
gaged with clear-cut and positive plans for the ac- 
quisition of California there was ample information, 
despite the fact that the Monroe Doctrine had been 
repeatedly reaffirmed. British warships continually 
hovered along the California coast, waiting for an 
opening and an opportunity to strike. To what ex- 
tent France actively engaged in these movements is 
not quite clear. 

Well aware of everything that was going on, the 
Government of the United States was determined to 
acquire California when the time came for it to pass 
from the possession of Mexico. To this end it sta- 
tioned at Monterey a very able, cautious and cour- 
ageous diplomatic agent in the person of Thomas O. 
Larkin, and there appears also to be no doubt that 
the appearance in California of Capt. John C. Fre- 



THE BEAR FLAG REPUBLIC 191 

mont, who was then an officer in the Army, attached 
to the Department of Topographical Engineers, was 
for a deeper purpose than that announced, which was 
that he had been sent out to survey the Rocky Moun- 
tain country and the Pacific Coast in the interests of 
travel and immigration. There was at least one point 
on which Pico, Castro and all the Californians of 
Spanish-Mexican origin agreed, and that was an in- 
tense distrust and hatred of Americans. So, in the 
midst of all this turmoil, dissension and uncertainty, 
the American population of California found itself 
very disagreeably bestowed. The American settlers 
soon found that they could not look to the Govern- 
ment of the United States to assist them in their as- 
pirations to secure control of California. If they 
applied to the commander of an American warship 
that happened to be at Monterey, San Francisco or 
any other port, they were invariably told that no as- 
sistance could be rendered to them for the reason that 
Mexico and the United States were at peace. But it 
appears to be quite clear that the Americans were 
constantly in touch with Fremont and his little party 
of pathfinders, and that they never failed of a sym- 
pathetic audience in that quarter. 

Nearly all the Americans living in California in 
the beginning of the year 1846 were located in the 
section of country adjacent to the Bay of San Fran- 
cisco. At the little town of Sonoma, in the lovely 
valley of The Seven Moons, forty-six miles north of 
San Francisco, or Yerba Buena, as it was then called, 
was located what had been for a long time the only 
really effective Mexican military garrison in the 
Province of California. The garrison was in com- 
mand of General Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo. For 
several years General Vallejo had kept the garrison 
intact mainly through his own energies and from the 



192 CALIFORNIA 

proceeds of his private purse. He had at times some 
weU-organized companies of soldiers. 

In the summer of 1846 General VaUejo's garrison 
had shrunk to a mere handful of men. Still, he was 
regarded as the representative of the military power 
of Mexico and his post was looked upon as a 
fortress. Just before dawn, June 14, 1846, Vallejo 
was rudely awakened from his peaceful slumbers and, 
together with his household and his official staff, was 
placed under arrest by a party of American settlers, 
who announced that they "had established in con- 
nection with others of their fellow citizens of the 
United States an independent Government based on 
Republican principles." This party of Americans 
consisted of twenty-four men, under the leadership 
of Capt. Ezekiel Merritt. A man named William B. 
Ide, and a dentist named Semple appeared to be Mer- 
ritt 's chief advisers and the next in command. In 
the party was also the famous Kit Carson, who had 
come to California as a member of Capt. Fremont's 
company. 

It appears that General Vallejo took the situation 
philosophically and invited his captors to make them- 
selves free with the hospitality of his house. A few 
hours afterward General Vallejo, his brother, Capt. 
Salvador Vallejo, and Lieut. Col. Victor Prudon were 
taken under guard on General VaUejo's own horses 
and imprisoned in Sutter's Fort at Sacramento. The 
prisoners having been safely forwarded, the Ameri- 
can invaders then gathered in the plaza of Sonoma, 
lowered the Mexican flag from the lofty staff on which 
it there was flying, and raised the ''bear flag" amid 
salvos of cheers. 

The capture of Sonoma and the raising of the bear 
flag were acts probably not exactly premeditated. 
They were led up to by a rather stirring incident 
which must be related in order V) get the proper bear- 



THE BEAR FLAG REPUBLIC 193 

ing on the entire matter. A few days before the cap- 
ture of Sonoma, General Castro, accompanied by 
Lieut. Jose Maria Alviso and Lieut. Francisco Arce 
and a party of about twelve men, set out from Mon- 
terey to Sonoma, issuing anti- American proclama- 
tions as they went. Castro's purpose in going to 
Sonoma was to secure from General Vallejo as much 
material assistance in his campaign as was possible. 
He wanted money, arms, munitions of war and horses. 
It is not clear what amount of success he had, but it 
is certain that he secured a number of horses from 
Vallejo and contrabanded whatever animals were 
in possession of the Franciscan Fathers at the Mis- 
sion. 

Castro then immediately returned to Monterey, 
breathing fire at every mile, and at once proceeded to 
perfect his military forces for the campaign which 
had for its object the expulsion of all Americans from 
California territory. It is also apparent that Castro 
had determined while he was at it to put Pio Pico 
out of business, and thus kill two birds with one 
stone. 

The Americans were now thoroughly alarmed, as 
they had every right to be, and a party of them went 
over to visit Fremont and to advise with him in his 
camp on the American River. The visitors told Cap- 
tain Fremont of the dire straits they felt themselves 
to be in. Fremont replied by saying that he was an 
of&cer of the United States Army and could not 
personally interfere, but he advised the Americans to 
do everything in their power to defend themselves. 
He went so far as to say that any of his men who 
were wilUng to take a hand in matters as they then 
stood, were at liberty to do so. Several of Fremont's 
men, including Kit Carson, promptly took advantage 
of the privilege thus granted and accompanied the 



194 CALIFORNIA 

American settlers as they sallied forth to look after 
their own interests. 

The party soon got word of Alviso and Arce, who 
were on their way from Sonoma with the horses. 
Under the leadership of Ezekiel Merritt the Ameri- 
cans surprised Alviso and his party early on the 
morning of June 10, and without a fight captured the 
CaUfornians and seized their arms and animals. 
After an interchange of views, not unlikely coupled 
with threats on the part of Merritt, the Californians 
were permitted to resume their journey, but were 
required to relinquish the horses. 

Alviso and his men hurried to San Jose and re- 
ported the matter to Castro's military aides. This 
act on the part of the Americans was regarded by 
Castro as the precursor of an invasion; it doubtless 
determined him to commence operations against the 
offensive Americans. In the meantime Merritt, with 
his spoils, returned to Fremont's camp, where plans 
were immediately formed for the attack on Sonoma 
which followed, as already shown, on June 14. 

With the capture of Castro 's horses, which was an 
overt act, the die was cast, and the Americans now 
determined to go to the end of the road. Sonoma was 
naturally in their minds, whether it be true or not 
that it had been in their minds before, and the cap- 
ture of that garrison, with the raising of the bear 
flag, followed the initial raid as a natural sequence. 
The story of the bear flag itself is not lacking in a 
certain quaint, half humorous, yet romantic interest. 
Neither was it without a dramatic side. 

No sooner had the detachment of captors left for 
Sutter's Fort with General Vallejo and the other 
prisoners, than the Mexican colors were hauled down 
by ready hands from the flag pole in the old plaza. 
The problem of supplying a new flag with which to 
supplant the Mexican ensign then faced the Ameri- 



THE BEAR FLAG REPUBLIC 195 

cans. In that party was a man named William L. 
Todd, who seemed to know something about handling 
a paint brush, and he was chosen to be the artist of 
the flag. It was unanimously agreed that no one 
had any authority to raise the Stars and Stripes 
and that if any one did so he would be seriously 
amenable to the United States Government. But 
it was the desire of every one present that a flag as 
near like the American flag as possible be adopted. 
It also seemed to be the consensus of opinion that a 
drawing of a grizzly bear be placed on the flag, as 
being eloquent of the fighting qualities with which 
the new Republic considered itself equipped. As 
there has been considerable controversy and dispute 
concerning this flag it is obviously proper to give the 
statement of the man who made the flag. He, if any 
one, ought to laiow all about it. Mr. Todd published 
in June, 1872, the following. 

''At a company meeting it was determined that we 
should raise a flag ; and it should be a bear en passant, 
with one star. One of the ladies at the garrison gave 
us a piece of brown domestic and Mrs. Capt. John 
Sears gave us some strips of red flannel about four 
inches wide. The domestic was new, but the flannel 
was said to have been part of a petticoat worn by 
Mrs. Sears across the mountains. For a corrobora- 
tion of these facts I refer to G. P. Swift and Pat Mc- 
Christian. I took a pen and with ink drew the out- 
lines of the bear and star upon the white cotton cloth. 
Linseed oil and Venetian red were found in the gar- 
rison and I painted the bear and star. To the best 
of my recollection, Peter Storm was asked to paint 
it, but he declined; and as no other person would 
undertake to do it, I did it. But Mr. Storm, with 
several others, assisted in getting the material and, 
I believe, mixed the paint. Underneath the bear and 
star were printed with a pen the words 'California 



196 CALIFORNIA 

Republic' in Roman letters. In painting the words 
I first lined out the letters with a pen, leaving out 
the letter *i' and putting *c' where 'i' should have 
been, and afterward the 'i' over the 'c' It was made 
with ink and as we had nothing to remove the marks 
of the false letters it now remains so on the flag." 

There were at least two other bear flags in ex- 
istence, but there can be no doubt that this one de- 
scribed by WilUam L. Todd, and which was raised 
at Sonoma June 14, 1846, was the original ensign. 

Four days later William B. Ide, who appears to 
have been selected for the leadership to succeed 
Ezekiel Merritt, issued and signed the following 
proclamation : 

**A proclamation to aU persons and citizens of the 
District of Sonoma, requesting them to remain at 
peace and follow their rightful occupations without 
fear of molestation. 

**The Commander-in-Chief of the troops assembled 
at the fortress of Sonoma gives this inviolable pledge 
to aU persons in California, not found under arms, 
that they shaU not be disturbed in their persons, their 
property or social relation, one with another, by men 
under his command. 

**He also solemnly declares his object to be: First, 
to defend himself and companions in arms, who were 
invited to this country by a promise of lands on which 
to settle themselves and families; who were also 
promised a Republican Government; when, having 
arrived in California, they were denied the privilege 
of buying or renting lands of their friends, who, in- 
stead of being allowed to participate in or being pro- 
tected by a Republican Government, were oppressed 
by a military despotism ; who were even threatened by 
a proclamation by the chief officers of the aforesaid 
despotism with extermination if they should not de- 
part out of the country, leaving aU their property, 



THE BEAR FLAG REPUBLIC 197 

arms and beasts of burden ; and thus deprived of their 
means of flight or defense, were to be driven through 
deserts inhabited by hostile Indians, to certain de- 
struction. 

**To overthrow a Government which has seized 
upon the property of the Missions for its individual 
aggrandizement; which has ruined and shamefully 
oppressed the laboring people of California by enor- 
mous exactions on goods imported into the country, 
is the determined purpose of the brave men who are 
associated under my command. 

**I also solemnly declare my object, in the second 
place, to be to invite all peaceable and good citizens 
of California who are friendly to the maintenance 
of good order and equal rights, and I do hereby in- 
vite them to repair to my camp at Sonoma without 
delay to assist us in establishing and perpetuating a 
Republican Government, which shall secure to aU 
civil and religious liberty ; which shall encourage vir- 
ture and literature ; which shall leave unshackled by 
fetters, agriculture, commerce and manufactures. 

"I further declare that I rely upon the rectitude 
of our intentions, the favor of Heaven and the brav- 
ery of those who are bound and associated with me 
by the principles of self-preservation, by the love of 
truth and the hatred of tyranny, for my hopes of 
success. 

**I furthermore declare that I believe that a Gov- 
ernment to be prosperous and happy must originate 
with the people who are friendly to its existence ; that 
the citizens are its guardians, the officers its servants, 
its glory its reward." 

No one who reads this remarkable document can 
fail to believe that the slurs cast upon the leaders 
of the Bear Flag Republic by California's most emi- 
nent and most voluminous historian are ill-founded 
and unjust. If the Bear Flag Republic had produced 



198 CALIFORNIA 

nothing more than this magnificent contribution to 
the literature of human rights, as written by William 
B. Ide, the affair has had sufficient excuse for even 
so brief an existence. The document marked Ide as 
a remarkable man, which he undoubtedly was — a man 
who. Like Caesar, according to Miles Standish, could 
"both write and fight and at each was equally skil- 
ful." 

Capt. WiUiam B. Ide was born in Ohio. In 1845 
he struck out from his native state and crossed by the 
overland trail to California. To show the respect in 
which he was held, after the Bear War he received 
an appointment from the Government of the United 
States as land surveyor for the Northern District of 
California, and was also appointed a Justice of the 
Peace. In 1851 he was elected Treasurer of Colusa 
County and later was elected County Judge of the 
same county, being a man learned in the law and hav- 
ing a license to practice that profession. He died in 
1852 at the early age of fifty years. 

The Republic having been duly declared and the 
Bear Flag raised, the gage of battle was thrown and 
military activities in the field at once began. 

The Americans again hastened to Captain Fre- 
mont where he still Lmgered in his camp on the Amer- 
ican River. Again they laid their cause at his feet. 
They brought him indisputable evidence that Castro 
was moving with three divisions of his army against 
Sonoma. The American hope of military success was 
all in Fremont. The die had been cast and the ques- 
tion now was, what would Fremont do ? His answer 
was swift and unhesitating. 

On June 23 he broke up his camp, and with ninety 
mounted men took the field. A backward glance 
through the mists of time at that little army, motley 
and picturesque to the last degree and made up of 



THE BEAR FLAG REPUBLIC 199 

as good fighting material as the world has ever seen, 
is well worth while. 

Riding ahead was the leader, himself already a 
romantic figure. He was called ''The Pathfinder," 
a title which posterity can not justly deny him. Physi- 
cally he was a slender man, but well proportioned. 
He wore a blue woolen shirt, open at the neck, 
trimmed with white and with a star at each point of 
the collar; over this a deerskin hunting shirt. A 
light cotton handkerchief was worn boimd around his 
head in lieu of hat or cap. His feet were encased 
in deerskin moccasins. He was mentally alert, brave 
and determined. Like most men he had his faults 
and has been much criticised, even cruelly so, but he 
had the qualifications and the character to hold rank 
as an officer in the Army of the United States, and 
he was an American, loyal to the heart's core. 

Following at Fremont's heels came his mounted 
rifles arrayed in thrice the colors of Joseph's coat. 
The majority were Americans and the rest were com- 
posed of French, English, Swiss, Russian, German, 
Greek and doubtless other nationalities, besides 
Pawnee, Delaware and California Indians. They 
were armed with rifles, double-barreled shotguns, 
horse-pistols, sabers, ships' cutlasses, bowie knives 
and pepper-box revolvers. Some of the Indians car- 
ried bows and arrows. 

Forth they rode in the golden weather down 
through the great valley of the Sacramento and across 
the sun-swept lomas, forcing the marches. At 2 
o'clock on the morning of June 25, Sonoma heard the 
thunder of Fremont's cavalcade. The garrison, 
sleeping lightly on its arms, was aroused by the cries 
of the sentinel, and it was at once known that the 
newcomers were Fremont and his men. Shouts of 
welcome from swelling hearts greeted the appearance 
of ''The Pathfinder." 



200 CALIFORNIA 

In the meantime, Lieutenant Ford of the Bear 
Flag army had mustered a squad of about twenty- 
three men for the purpose of rescuing two Americans 
who were held as prisoners by a portion of Castro's 
forces. It was known that the CaUfornians had al- 
ready killed two other American prisoners, really 
murdering them in cold blood. Ford 's squadron came 
upon the enemy at a place near San Rafael, called 
Laguna San Antonio, where there was a skirmish, 
Ford putting the Calif ornians utterly to rout, wound- 
ing a niunber of them without loss to his own forces, 
capturing nearly all their horses and rescuing one 
of the prisoners whom he had been seeking. Return- 
ing to Sonoma with his victorious tidings and the 
spoils of the fight. Ford found Fremont and his rifle- 
men in the garrison. 

Fremont allowed himself, his men and horses only 
a few hours' rest following his arrival at Sonoma. 
His information was that General Castro and de la 
Torre were at San Rafael with a force of two hundred 
and fifty men. Fremont sallied forth to make an 
attack. At about 4 o 'clock on the afternoon of June 
26 he came in sight of what was thought to be the 
enemy lying intrenched. The Americans cautiously 
approached the position and then charged upon the 
fortification. Fremont, followed closely by Kit Car- 
son and by James W. Marshall, who was later to 
immortalize himself by the discovery of gold at 
Coloma, were the first to break through the fortifica- 
tion. They found only four Californians, the main 
body having departed. The Americans, however, 
caught sight of General Castro on the distant hills 
approaching the Bay. 

Fremont remained at San Rafael for several days, 
when one evening a scout brought into camp an In- 
dian runner whom he had captured with a letter from 
Torre to Castro, in which it was stated that the Cali- 



THE BEAE FLAG REPUBLIC 201 

fomia forces would be concentrated to march upon 
Sonoma and attack it the following morning. Fre- 
mont at once struck out with his forces for Sonoma, 
arriving there at midnight. But it appears that the 
letter found on the Indian runner may have been a 
ruse. At any rate Torre, hiding in his camp, saw 
the Americans rushing back to Sonoma. Whatever 
may have been their original intentions, the Calif or- 
nians did not attack the Bear Flag fortress, but re- 
treated safely by way of Sausalito to Santa Clara. 

As Fremont and his forces approached in the mid- 
night darkness the garrison lay awake, alert and 
nervous, but determined. The defenders thought 
surely it was Castro's army come to attack them. The 
advance sentries heard the tramp of horses and gave 
the alarm. The garrison, standing tense upon its 
arms, realized that perhaps the moment had come 
when the fate of the new Republic was to be decided. 
What happened then can best be told in the words 
of William B. Ide, the commander, whose ability of 
expression has already been noted in the docmnent 
in which he proclaimed the Bear Flag Republic. 

**Thus prepared," says Ide, "in less than one min- 
ute from the first alarm, aU listened for the sound of 
the tramping horses. We heard them coming ! — then 
low down under the darkened canyon we saw them 
coming! In a moment the truth flashed across my 
mind; the Spaniards were deceiving us! In a mo- 
ment orders were given to the captains of the eigh- 
teen-pounders to reserve fire until my rifles should 
give the word; and, to prevent mistake, I hastened 
to a position a hundred yards in front of the cannon, 
and in a little to the right oblique, so as to gain a 
nearer view. 'Come back, you will lose your life!' 
said a dozen voices. ' Silence ! ' roared Captain Grigs- 
by; *I have seen the old man in a bullpen before to- 
day ! ' The blankets of the advancing host flowed in 



202 CALIFORNIA 

the breeze. They had advanced to within two hun- 
dred yards of the place where I stood. The impatience 
of the men at the guns became intense, lest the enemy 
come too near so as to lose the effect of the spread- 
ing of the shot. I made a motion to lay down my 
rifle. The matches were swinging. 'My God! they 
swing the matches!' cried the weU-known voice of 
Kit Carson. 'Hold on, hold on!' we shouted; ' 'tis 
Fremont, 'tis Fremont!' we cried, in a voice heard 
by every man of both parties, while Captain Fre- 
mont dashed away to his left to take cover behind 
an adobe house ; and in a moment after he made one 
of his most gallant charges on our fort. It was a 
noble exploit; he came in a full gallop, right in the 
face and teeth of our two long 18 's!" 

Fremont now saw that he had been outwitted, but 
he at once determined to yet catch Torre or Castro, 
or both, if possible. Delaying at Sonoma only long 
enough to give his men breakfast, he again struck 
out with his forces for San Rafael, arriving there 
at the old Mission twenty-four hours after the time 
he had left it, but he still found no traces of the Cali- 
f ornians. During his absence the enemy had grasped 
the opportunity to retreat across the Bay. Captain 
Fremont then proceeded to the fortress at San Pablo, 
only to find it abandoned. He spiked the guns and 
set up his camp on shore, and it was at about this 
time that Captain Semple, with a detachment of the 
Bear Flag army, appeared in the streets of San 
Francisco and captured Robert Ridley, the captain 
of the Port of Yerba Buena. 

As throwing some light on the retreat of the Cali- 
f ornians from San Rafael and Fremont's presence 
on the shores of the Bay, at that juncture, the fol- 
lowing statement from Capt. William B. Phelps of 
Lexington, Mass., who was lying at Sausalito with 
his bark, the Moscow, is interesting and illuminating : 



THE BEAR FLAG EEPUBLIC 203 

*'Wlien Fremont passed San Rafael in pursuit 
of Capt. de la Torre's party, I had just left them," 
says Captain Phelps, "and he sent me word that he 
would drive them to Sausalito that night, when they 
could not escape unless they got my boat. I has- 
tened back to the ship and made all safe. There was 
a large launch lying near the beach; this was an- 
chored farther oft, and I put provisions on board to 
be ready for Fremont, should he need her. At night 
there was not a boat on the shore. Torre's party 
must shortly arrive and show fight, or surrender. 
Toward morning we heard them arrive, and to our 
surprise, they were seen passing with a small boat 
from the shore to the laimch; (a small boat had ar- 
rived from Yerba Buena during the night, which had 
proved their salvation). I dispatched a note to the 
commander of the Portsmouth, sloop-of-war, then 
lying at Yerba Buena, a cove (now San Francisco), 
informing him of their movements and intimating 
that a couple of his boats could easily intercept and 
capture them. Captain Montgomery (United States 
naval officer in command of the Portsmouth) replied 
that not having received any official notice of war 
existing he could not act in the matter. 

*'It was thus the poor scamps escaped. They 
pulled clear of the ship and thus escaped supping on 
grape and cannister which we had prepared for them. 

"Fremont arrived and camped opposite my ves- 
sel, the bark Moscow, the following night. They were 
early astir the next morning when I landed to visit 
Captain Fremont, and were all variously employed 
in taking care of their horses, mending saddles, clean- 
ing their arms, etc. I had not, up to this time, seen 
Fremont, but from reports of his character and ex- 
ploits my imagination had painted him as a large- 
sized, martial-looking man or personage, towering 



204 CALIFORNIA 

above Ms companions, whiskered and ferocious look- 
ing. 

"I took a survey of the party, but could not dis- 
cover any one who looked as I thought the Captain 
to look. Seeing a tall, lank, Kentucky-looking chap 
(Dr. E. Semple), dressed in a greasy deerskin hunt- 
ing shirt, with trousers to match, and which termi- 
nated just below the knees, his head surmounted by a 
coonskin cap, tail in front, who, I supposed was an 
officer, as he was giving orders to the men, I ap- 
proached and asked him if the Captain was in camp. 
He looked and pointed out a slender made, well-pro- 
portioned man sitting in front of a tent. ... A 
few minutes' conversation convinced me that I stood 
in the presence of the King of the Rocky Mountains. ' ' 

Fremont lingered with his force at Sausalito and 
vicinity until the second day of July, when they re- 
turned to Sonoma. On the 4th the national holiday 
was celebrated with great enthusiasm, and upon the 
following day Fremont organized his new California 
Battalion of Mounted Riflemen, two hundred and 
fifty strong. On this same day a meeting of all the 
soldiers and American settlers at Sonoma was held 
for the purpose of making a thorough reorganization 
of the affairs of the Bear Flag Republic. A Declar- 
ation of Independence was drawn up and signed, re- 
iterating the position of California, from the Ameri- 
can residents' point of view, to be a distinct, separate 
and sovereign nation. Fremont was made Comman- 
der and it appears that he was given authority over 
everything and everybody, even supplanting Ide. 

Fremont addressed the assembly and pointed out 
1;he fact that the country north of San Francisco Bay 
was now in complete control of his forces, and he 
declared his intentions of setting out forthwith with 
his new battalion of riflemen to find Castro and to 
prosecute the war until the Mexican power was de- 



THE BEAR FLAG REPUBLIC 205 

stroyed. He caused all the participants in the rebel- 
lion to sign a document pledging themselves to obedi- 
ence to their officers. All these things having been 
accomplished, Fremont with his forces left Sonoma 
on the following day to prosecute the war. In the 
meantime a vital incident had occurred at Monterey. 

Probably on the second day of July, 1846, the same 
day upon which Fremont left his camp at Sausalito 
for Sonoma, Commodore John Drake Sloat arrived 
in his flagship, the Savannah, at the harbor of Mon- 
terey, where he found two other United States ships, 
the Cyane and the Levant. The Portsmouth, with 
Captain Montgomery, was still in the harbor of San 
Francisco. Commodore Sloat carried with him in- 
structions from the United States Government to 
capture aU California ports and hold them in event 
of war between the United States and Mexico. These 
instructions had been issued more than a year previ- 
ously. Nearly two months prior to July 2, 1846, the 
date of Sloat 's arrival at Monterey, war had been 
declared between the United States and Mexico, and 
hostilities were under way. This Sloat knew, and he 
had therefore come to California to put into force 
the instructions which he had so long carried. He 
had come from Mazatlan and as soon as he had an- 
chored in the harbor of Monterey, he sent for Mr. 
Larkin, the United States Consul and confidential 
agent of the United States Government, and then 
learned of the Bear Flag Republic and Captain Fre- 
mont's participation in it. 

It clearly appears that the Commodore and the 
Consul were greatly troubled as to how to act in re- 
gard to the situation, seeming to feel that Fremont, 
through the course he had pursued, had in some way 
embarrassed them. Why they should have been em- 
barrassed it is difficult to understand. Mr. Larkin, 
it was well known, had never sympathized with the 



206 CALIFORNIA 

Bear Flag Republic nor with Fremont's course, but 
certainly this had nothing to do with the case so far 
as Sloat was concerned. But that the Commodore 
was given to vacillation is not disputed. Indeed, he 
was officially censured for his indecision in this very 
matter. 

Instead of promptly and without parley seizing 
the port of Monterey, Sloat hesitated for a period 
of five days. The Commodore at length, on July 7, 
sent four of his officers ashore with a demand to the 
Mexican Comandante to surrender the port of Mon- 
terey, with all troops, arms and other public prop- 
erty. The Comandante replied that he had neither 
ti'oops nor arms to surrender, w^hich was the truth. 
Immediately upon receipt of this reply, two hun- 
dred and fifty American marines and seamen were 
landed under command of Captain Mervine. The 
force marched to the custom-house and the Ameri- 
can colors were hoisted amid the cheers of the troops 
and a salute of twenty-one guns from each of the 
American men-of-war lying in the harbor. 

Three days after this memorable event a man 
named William Scott overtook Fremont and his 
riflemen within ten miles of the city of Sacramento, 
where Sutter's Fort was located, carrying with him 
the joyful news that Sloat had taken Monterey, where 
the American flag was at that moment floating on the 
breeze, and that war had been declared and was then 
raging between Mexico and the United States. Fre- 
mont pushed on to Sutter's Fort. Arriving there 
the next day, the bear flag which was floating over 
the garrison was hauled down, and eager hands ran 
up the Stars and Stripes amid great rejoicing. A 
salute of twenty-one guns was fired from a brass 
four-pounder. Two days prior to this Lieut. Joseph 
Warren Revere of the Portsmouth left San Fran- 
cisco harbor with a party and reached the garrison 



THE BEAR FLAG REPUBLIC 207 

of Sonoma with the same great news that had over- 
taken Captain Fremont on his way to Sutter's Fort. 

Sonoma received the news with the same glad ac- 
clamation that Fremont and his army many miles 
away had received it. From its gleaming staff in the 
old plaza the crude ensign, which William Todd had 
made from a piece of cotton cloth and strips of a 
red flannel petticoat of Mrs. John Sears, and on which 
only a few weeks previously he had painted a lone 
star and a grizzly bear, was hauled down and the 
Bear Flag Republic and the bear flag itself were 
folded away with ''seven thousand yesterdays." 

The flag is no more and the Republic which it rep- 
resented has also passed into history. No man is now 
living who took part in its brief but stirring life. It 
existed for only a handful of days and at the will 
of only a handful of men, yet while it lasted it was 
as real a republic as any that ever existed. Its an- 
nals are as vivid as any other that have ever been 
written, and the tale they tell clothes now with a cer- 
tain dignity, in the judgment of time, the immortal 
''Pathfinder," who was the soul of the adventure; 
William B. Ide, Henry Ford, Todd, Merritt, Semple 
and all who filled the breach and held the ground. 
Certainly the names and the memories of these men 
must remain dear to their countrymen, no matter 
how others have viewed them or may view them still. 

As time goes on and the years pass into centuries, 
this and many another fateful incident in the his- 
tory of California will stand out with startling dis- 
tinctness. The desperate valor of Cabrillo, the Dis- 
coverer, will grow more vivid as the mind makes 
pictures of the past. Ever clearer against the sunset 
skies will appear the brown-robed ghost of Junipero 
Serra as he kneels on the desolate shore praying for 
the white sail of salvation to come to the rescue of 
starving San Diego. 



208 CALIFORNIA 

So, also, wiU the painter, the poet and the dreamer 
of dreams in days that are yet to be, thrill the souls of 
the people by epics in literature and masterpieces on 
canvas that shaU bring forth again from the shadows 
of time the '^ California Republic" of 1846, with its 
Bear Flag and the heroic figures of the dauntless 
American men who raised that crude, quaint ensign 
to the free winds of heaven from the old Plaza of 
Sonoma in the Valley of the Seven Moons. 




1^ 



O 2 



:x 



T«» ^'*i»aH-.v«a.| 



VIII 

THE AKGONAUTS 

Picture in your mind the rocky hillside of a New 
England farm in the springtime of the year 1848. 
A clear-eyed, sturdy young man, his cheeks aglow 
with health, his hands to the plow, is breaking the 
stubborn glebe for the seedtime of hope, and all there 
is to his hope is that when comes the harvest in the 
golden autinnn his household in the little farmhouse 
yonder may face the coming of the always rigorous 
winter with sufficient fare, and perhaps a few scant, 
hard-earned dollars. The young plowman is follow- 
ing in the footsteps of his father before him, and his 
father's father, through many generations of hard, 
wholesome, honest yet unremunerative toil. To the 
young man the attainment of wealth, and especially 
its sudden attainment, has been a dream with which 
to pass an evening by the fireside reading of Aladdin 
and his lamp or another tale as wonderful. 

Picture now the young man lifting his head from 
his toil to answer the hailing shout of a neighbor 
who has come from the near-by village and is ap- 
proaching the stony hillside,flaunting excitedly in his 
hand a newspaper fresh from the mail bag of the 
village postoffice. The plowman halts his team and 
wonderingly awaits his neighbor, who comes on 
apace, quite breathless with some visible and strong 
excitement. Soon the two men are standing face to 
face, the newspaper trembles in their hands, and now 
with heads together they read with glowing eyes the 
thrill of the announcement that gold has been dis- 
covered in far-away California. 



210 CALIFORNIA 

Perhaps the furrow in that stony hillside field was 
never finished by the hand that began it in dull hope 
and apathy of spirits at the dawn of that springtime 
morning. Perhaps the team was left standing tiU 
feU the shades of night, as these two friends fed 
themselves to the full on the dream of that golden 
land that waited for their coming in a golden clime. 

They thriUed with the thought that they might, in 
one thriUing adventure, cross the sun-lit plains, or 
set forth by sea around the Horn, throw off their 
heritage of poverty and clothe themselves in the rai- 
ment of kings. 

Not only to the stony hiUside farms of New Eng- 
land, but to aU the farms of the Atlantic seaboard, to 
the shops, the mills, the countinghouses and the 
schools of that region, and, farther still, to every re- 
gion of the whole civilized world, spread the news 
of the discovery of gold in California in that mem- 
orable springtime of 1848. By every fireside and on 
every spot where men gathered together, from Up 
to lip was passed the tale that in the shining streams 
of the new Eldorado on the shores of the Sunset sea, 
gold dust and gold nuggets lay almost as plentiful 
as the sands themselves. 

And the tale was true. Never before in history and 
never since was so much gold gathered in so short 
a time by so many men who were, the year before 
and all their lives before, the slaves of poverty, as 
was gathered by those who participated in the gold 
rush of 1849. These men came to be called ''The Ar- 
gonauts." Like Jason, of old, they went in search 
of the golden fleece. And they found it. No such 
days as these were ever known before, nor shall the 
like of them be known again. Even though virgin 
gold-fields equal in wealth to the virgin gold-fields 
of California were to be discovered in these days or 
in days to come, the railroads, the telegraph, the 



THE AEGONAUTS 211 

ocean greyhounds, the automobile and not unlikely 
the airship, would rob the opportunity of the romance 
and glamor that cling to the ''Days of Forty-nine" 
in California. 

Moreover, if a discovery of this nature were to be 
made in these times, the wealth which the discovery 
represented would be seized upon by syndicates and 
other combinations of capital before the discovery 
was a week old. Poor men in large numbers had 
their great day in California during the years that 
followed the finding of the first gold nugget on the 
American River, in 1848. It is a day that is past 
and can not come again. No doubt many poor men 
will become rich men in times to be, but it will not 
happen in the way that it happened when the Argo- 
nauts sailed the sea and the transcontinental trails 
were thick with overland pioneers. With the pass- 
ing of the people who made those days what they 
were, Romance has shot its brightest arrow and ends 
with a sigh the most fascinating tale it has ever told. 

Almost in the very footsteps of the first Franciscan 
missionaries, American white men began to drift into 
California. It is certain, at least, that they made 
their appearance there soon after the Revolutionary 
war. But it is true that their numbers were very 
small during several generations. A New England 
trading schooner would now and then put into a Cali- 
fornia port to trade with the Missions and the In- 
dians, and occasionally leave behind it an adventur- 
ous passenger or a sailor who had wearied of the sea. 
From across the great Rockies came also now and 
then a wanderer upon some vague quest, to find at 
last "The Land of Heart's Desire." So, in this way 
and that, there was quite a considerable number of 
American white men, as well as white men of other 
races than the Latin race, located in California in 
1848. 



212 CALIFORNIA 

It is a strange fact to contemplate, that the Span- 
ish race, which was preeminently a race of gold- 
seekers, was in full and undisputed possession of 
California for a period of four-score years without 
making the discovery that it was the richest gold- 
bearing region that has ever been known on the face 
of the earth. In other words, the same people that 
had penetrated to the farthest recesses of South 
America in search of gold, which they took away with 
them to Spain by the shipload, and the same people 
that had wrung from the Incas of Peru and the Mon- 
tezumas of Mexico untold treasures, possessed the 
hills and the valleys of a far richer country for more 
than three-quarters of a century without ever know- 
ing that there lay shining at the bottom of the streams 
and locked in the bosom of the mountains of Cali- 
fornia a wealth of gold that was to make the wealth 
of the Aztecs appear paltry and insignificant. Even 
as the Bay of San Francisco was destined to be dis- 
covered by a landsman and not by a mariner, as 
would seem natural, so was it destined that gold in 
California was to be discovered, not by a Spaniard 
nor the son of a Spaniard who with his people before 
him had long occupied California, but by an Ameri- 
can who was neither a prospector nor a miner, but 
an everyday working millwright. 

It has been authenticated that gold had been dis- 
covered in California prior to 1848, but the discovery 
was unimportant and without results. It remained 
for James W. Marshall, a native of New Jersey and 
a Californian by choice and adoption, to make the 
discovery in January, 1848, which set the whole civ- 
ilized world on fire with excitement. The historic 
spot was on the South Fork of the American River, 
where the present little town of Coloma, in El Dorado 
County, now stands. The spot is permanently marked 
by a magnificent, towering monument, capped by a 



THE ARGONAUTS 213 

lifelike, sculptured figure of Marshall, the discoverer. 
/' The incidents which led up to Marshall's presence^ 
at Coloma are interesting, as well as important. Mar- 
shall was a good timberman and well informed as to 
milling operations. Owing to his skill in these mat- 
ters he found employment in California with Capt. 
John A. Sutter, a Swiss, but a naturalized citizen of 
the Eepublic of Mexico. Captain Sutter owned large 
land grants from the Mexican Government and he 
was a sterling man of great business capacity and 
enterprise. He built a fort which was located within 
the present municipality of Sacramento, the capital 
of California, a short distance from which he operat- 
ed a flouring mill. He also engaged on an extensive 
scale in lumbering and agriculture, securing from his 
fields large harvests for his mill. The fort was for 
the protection of himself and family, his employes 
and the residents of the place generally, against the 
Indians. The Bear Flag war and the Mexican war 
considerably upset Sutter's business, but in August, 
1847, he nevertheless determined to make some ex- 
pansion. With his keen foresight he saw that peace 
would inevitably arrive and that with it there would 
come a great many new people to California. To 
enlarge his business to meet the demands that he knew 
would be made upon it, he arranged for new opera- 
tions. 

Consequently, Sutter entered into a partnership 
with Marshall for a sawmill to be built on the South 
Fork of the American River. According to the agree- 
ment, Marshall was to select the site for the mill and 
to operate it for one-fourth of the Imnber. The cap- 
ital was furnished by Sutter and it was further 
agreed between the two men that if the war should 
end in favor of Mexico the whole ownership of the 
property was to divert to Sutter, because of his citi- 
zenship in the Mexican Republic ; but if, on the con- 



214 CALIFORNIA 

trary, the war were to end in favor of the United 
States, Marshall, as an American citizen, should be- 
come sole owner. 

It appears that Marshall favored the location of 
the new mill on Butte Creek in the present County of 
Butte, but Samuel Kyburz, Sutter's outside fore- 
man, prevailed upon his employer to locate the new 
enterprise at Coloma. 

Marshall and Kyburz, accompanied by a German 
millwright named Gingery, and a few Indian labor- 
ers, began work at Coloma during the summer. With 
the approach of winter they had erected a double log 
cabin in which to live. To this cabin came Peter L. 
Wimmer, his wife and family. Wiromer was to work 
at the mill and Mrs. Wimmer was to cook for the 
men. Upon her arrival she found Marshall very 
ill and she immediately proceeded to nurse him back 
to health. 

At the close of December, 1847, the mill was thought 
to be ready for operations, but a trial brought out the 
fact that the miU-wheel was not properly placed and 
the deepening of the tail-race became necessary. In 
order to accomplish this necessary greater depth, 
the Indians were directed to pick out the large rocks 
during the daytime; the water, which had been 
dammed, was released at night in order to sluice out 
the earth. During this process the first little handful 
of gold that awakened a whole world to an intense 
state of excitement was discovered in the now historic 
mill-race at Coloma. 

There is plenty of evidence to prove that James W. 
Marshall was a rather erratic man and that his mem- 
ory for facts was not the best in the world. Many 
contradictory statements have been made regarding 
his discovery ; Marshall even contradicting himself on 
several occasions. Fortunately, however, very suffi- 
'cient, unassailable testimony exists to prove that 



THE ARGONAUTS 215 

Marshall is entitled to the honor which must remain 
his till the end of time. 

Mrs. Jane Winnner, the good woman who cooked 
for the men at the mill and who nursed Marshall back 
to life from his serious illness, made at one time an 
authoritative statement in regard to the discovery, 
the truth of which is not doubted. 

''Work on the mill-race, dam and mill had been 
going on for about six months," said Mrs. Wimmer, 
''when one morning along the last days of December, 
1847, or the first week of January, 1848, the discovery 
was made. Mr. Marshall and Mr. Winuner went 
down to see what had been done while Mr. Marshall 
had been away at Southern ports. The water was 
entirely shut off from the tail-race, and as they walked 
along, talking and examining the work, just ahead 
of them on a little rough, muddy rock, lay something 
looking bright like gold. They both saw it, but Mr. 
Marshall was the first to pick it up, and as he looked 
at it, doubted its being gold. 

"Our little son Martin was along with them, and 
Marshall gave it to him to bring up to me. He came 
in a hurry and said: 'Here, mother, here's something 
that Mr. Marshall and Pa found and they want you 
to put it in salaratus water and see if it will tarnish. ' 
I said, 'This is gold, and I will throw it into my lye 
kettle (which I had just tried with a feather),*^ and 
if it is gold, it will be gold when it comes out. ' 

''At the breakfast table one of the work hands 
raised his head from eating and said: 'I heard some- 
thing about gold being discovered. What about it?' 
Mr. Marshall told him to ask Jenny, and I told him 
it was in my soap kettle. Mr. Marshall said it was 
there if it had not gone back to California. A plank 
was brought to me to lay my soap onto, and I cut 
it into chunks, but it was not to be found. At the 
bottom of the kettle was a double handful of potash, 



216 CALIFORNIA 

which I lifted in my two hands, and there was my 
gold as bright as it could be. Mr. Marshall still con- 
tended that it was not gold, but whether he was afraid 
his men would leave hun, or reaUy thought so, I don't 
know." 

Mrs. Wimmer was a Georgia woman and had seen 
gold mined in her native state, which accounts for 
her display of knowledge on the historic occasion of 
Marshall's discovery. 

On January 28, 1848, Marshall appeared at Sut- 
ter's Fort and in an excited manner demanded a pri- 
vate audience with Captain Sutter. The audience 
was cheerfully and promptly granted and the account 
of what then transpired has been told in Sutter's own 
words. 

"Marshall asked me if the door was locked," said 
Captain Sutter. '*I said, *No, but I will lock it.' He 
was a singular man and I took this to be some freak 
of his. I was not in the least afraid of him. I had 
no weapon. There was no gun in the room. I only 
supposed, as he was queer, that he took this queer 
way to tell me some secret. 

"He first said to me: 'Are we alone T I replied 
yes. * I want two bowls of water, ' said he. The bowls 
of water were brought. 'Now, I want a stick of red- 
wood, ' said Marshall, ' and some twine and some sheet 
copper.' 'What do you want of these things, Mar- 
shall?' said I. 'I want to make some scales,' he re- 
plied. 'But I have scales enough in the apothecary's 
shop, ' said I. ' I did not think of that, ' said Marshall. 
I went, myself, and got some scales. 

"When I returned with the scales I shut the door, 
but did not lock it again. Then Marshall pulled out 
of his pocket a white cotton rag which contained 
something rolled up in it. Just as he was unfolding 
it to show me the contents, the door was opened by a 
clerk passing through who did not know that we were 



THE ARGONAUTS 217 

in the room. 'There!' exclaimed Marshall, 'did I 
not tell you we had listeners?' I appeased him, or- 
dered the clerk to retire and watch the door. 

"Then he brought out his mysterious secret again. 
Opening the cloth he held it before me in his hand. 
It contained what might have been about an ounce 
and a half of gold dust, flaky and in grains, the largest 
piece not quite as large as a pea, and from that down 
to less than a pinhead in size. 'I believe this is gold,' 
said Marshall, 'but the people at the mill laughed 
at me and called me crazy.' I carefully examined 
it and said to him: 'Well, it looks so; we will try 
it.' Then I went down to the apothecary's shop and 
got some aqua-fortis and applied it. The stuff stood 
the test. 

"Marshall then asked me if I had any silver. I 
said yes, and produced a few dollars. Then we put 
an equal weight of gold in one side and silver in the 
other, and dropping the two in bowls of water, the 
gold went down and outweighed the silver under 
water. Then I brought out a volume of an old en- 
cyclopedia, a copy of which I happened to have, to 
see what other tests there were. Then I said to him : 
'I believe this is the finest kind of gold.' " 

The fact that Captain Sutter kept a careful diary 
of events and that he was a man of great reliability 
of character render his account of Marshall's visit 
entirely trustworthy. Sutter's diary and those kept 
by Henry W. Bigler and Azariah Smith fix the 
date of Marshall's discovery of gold at Coloma as 
having been January 24, 1848. Marshall remained 
over at the fort on the night of January 29, returning 
next day to Coloma. Upon his arrival at the mill, 
he exacted a promise from the Indians and the white 
men there that they would keep the discovery secret 
for a period of six weeks, until a new flour mill then 
•»mder construction could be completed. 



218 CALIFORNIA 

But, of course, the promise was not kept. The 
men at the mill could not restrain their excitement 
and eagerness, and immediately the great news fled 
down the ripples of the American River, taking Cali- 
fornia by the ears and spreading like wildfire into 
all the highways and byways of the world. 

In the great rush for wealth which ensued and out 
of which, during the first short five years of its ex- 
istence, $1,200,000,000 in California gold was flung 
into the coffers of the world, a natural curiosity will 
arise to learn what became of James Wilson Marshall, 
the Jerseyman who started it all going. It is a 
pathetic story. 

Standing there with the wealth of the New El- 
dorado at his feet, and before the mighty hosts that 
were coming across land and sea to put eager hands 
upon it were able to arrive, Marshall's opportunity 
to amass immeasurable wealth in an incredibly short 
space of time was greater than any man ever had 
before in the history of the world. 

He made a good start by putting a number of white 
men and Indians at work for him digging out gold 
here and there, and paying him large tribute. Even 
when the creeks and benches were covered with 
miners, he still remained in possession of two legal 
claims which were alone sufficient to make him very 
wealthy. But, instead of attending to his own 
business, he took the queer notion in his head that 
nobody had a right to dig gold in California with- 
out his consent. So he went about from place to 
place interfering with all whom he met, until finally 
he lost everything he had except his old cabin at 
Coloma. Here in later years he planted vines and 
for a while conducted a successful vineyard, but his 
erratic habits again mastered him and, worse than 
all, he became an habitual inebriate. About the year 
1870 he went on a lecturing tour from which he real- 



THE ARGONAUTS 219 

ized very handsome returns, all of which he squan- 
dered in drink and upon the human parasites who 
steadfastly fastened themselves upon him. From 1872 
to 1876 he was in receipt of an appropriation from 
the state legislature sufficient to keep him in comfort. 
Ultimately this appropriation was cut off. In the 
later years of his life he became a common sot and 
a charge upon the charity of the community where 
he existed. 

Like the salmon to its native waters, Marshall 
'drifted back at last to the scene that made his name 
immortal. There in his squalid cabin, one day, they 
found him dead, lying fully dressed on his miserable 
couch, his hat pulled over his eyes. Thus died the 
man who had stood one fateful hour basking in the 
full sun of Fortune, a darling of the gods, with a 
golden world that was all his own spread around him. 

It is astonishing with what rapidity the news of 
the discovery of gold in California spread to all quar- 
ters of the globe, especially when we consider the 
fact that the means for the dissemination of news in 
the year 1849 were really very crude and inefficient. 
But the fact remains that the word traveled practi- 
cally everywhere in an astoundingly short space of 
time and that the effect of it all was to set in motion 
a migration which seems to be without parallel in 
history. 

Not only was every available sailing vessel on the 
Atlantic seaboard of America chartered and over- 
loaded with passengers headed for the gold fields, 
but the harbor of San Francisco soon beheld also 
within its portals ship after ship from every sea in 
all parts of the earth. And while it is true that the 
hosts which came were composed largely of Ameri- 
cans, the muddy streets and hillsides of the old Mis- 
sion town of Yerba Buena were colorful with the 
Oriental stranger, the Celt, the Teuton, the yellow- 



220 CALIFORNIA 

haired Scandinavian and men of every race and 
clime. 

Then ensued a wild, free-handed life that was with- 
out precedent to guide it and that, when it passed 
at last, vanished to return no more. The farmer 
boys of New England and of the Eastern states, the 
clerk, the lawyer and even the adventurous clergy- 
man, found themselves suddenly relieved from the 
staid provincial restriction which had hedged them 
in from birth. They had left their mothers, sisters 
and sweethearts behind them. Sunday came and the 
bell of the meeting-house no longer rang in their 
ears. The few women that the exodus had gathered 
with it were bedizened and painted and not the best 
company for unsophisticated villagers for the first 
time set free from a century of accumulated decency. 

Yet it is to the great credit of these men that of 
themselves they soon established rude, but effective, 
law and order out of the chaos in which they found 
themselves. Without the authority of government 
to uphold them, they made it obligatory upon the 
thief to keep his hands in his own pocket and the 
murderer to stay his bloody hands in fear and dread 
of the summary vengeance that was sure to be vis- 
ited on him. These men, with the traditions of gen- 
erations strong upon them, came soon to establish 
a code for the guidance of themselves and others 
which, while it left the gambler free to ply his avo- 
cation, still compelled him to deal square. And it 
came to pass that the miner in the "diggings" could 
leave his cabin unlocked by day or night, to find his 
store of gold dust untouched and safe upon his re- 
turn. 

The San Francisco to which the Argonauts came 
through the Golden Gate in 1849 was a squalid and 
entirely unimportant place. The old Mission estab- 
lishment, and the commercial and social life which 



THE ARGONAUTS 221 

clustered around it, was located some distance back 
from the shores of the Bay. The little Spanish vil- 
lage located where is now the business activity of 
San Francisco and where the ships put in to land 
their passengers was called Yerba Buena, meaning 
good herb, the name springing from an herb which 
grew in profusion there and which possessed cer- 
tain medicinal qualities. Yerba Buena village was 
located on a small cove which has long since been 
filled up and occupied by the great Ferry Building 
and other structures. In 1849 Yerba Buena con- 
tained probably not more than fifty insignificant 
houses. 

It will be seen from this that San Francisco in 
1849 was in no way prepared to receive and care for 
an influx which numbered many thousands of peo- 
ple. Fortunately, however, there came with the 
Argonaut the inevitable trader and merchant. The 
hillsides were soon covered magically with the tents 
of the wanderers, and new buildings sprang up like 
mushrooms. The butcher, the baker and the candle- 
stickmaker had set up their thrones and were driving 
a trade that was phenomenal both for its volume and 
the measure of its profits. Candles sold at $3 apiece, 
salt pork at $1 per pound, ham at $2 per pound, flour 
$1 a pound, socks $3 per pair, and a white shirt for 
$20. 

These were the prices at which the men bound for 
the mines, outfitting themselves and buying in bulk, 
could purchase things. The prices of food were even 
higher in the restaurants to customers sitting down 
at meals. An old bill of fare at one of these restau- 
rants shows that a plate of soup cost $1. A piece of 
pork with apple sauce, $1.25; California eggs, $1 
each ; curlew roast, or boiled to order, $3 ; one sweet 
potato, 50 cents ; a piece of mince pie, 75 cents ; a rum 
omelette, $2, and so on, showing that a man could 



222 CALIFOENIA 

get most anything to eat if he had the money to pay 
for it. It frequently happened that a tenderfoot 
landing from the ship with his last five-dollar bill 
in his pocket, went into one of these restaurants and 
ate a hearty meal on the theory that it would cost 
him about the same that he would pay at home, only 
to find that he had squandered his last cent on the 
first meal he ate in the new Eldorado. 

Everything was hurly-burly and chaos in San 
Francisco in those early days of 1849 and, indeed, 
throughout the first few years of the great rush. One 
of the first men to sail around the Horn with the 
Argonauts afterward wrote vividly of his recollec- 
tions of those days, in the manner of many other 
Argonauts. He tells of one of the sights which par- 
ticularly attracted his attention on his arrival in 
San Francisco. 

''There was," said he, **a newly constructed side- 
walk, commencing at the building at that time occu- 
pied by Simmons, Hutchinson & Co., and extending 
in the direction of Adams & Company's express office 
for a distance of about seventy-five yards, I think. 
In any other portion of the earth except California, 
this sidewalk would have been considered a very ex- 
travagant piece of work, hardly excelled by the golden 
pavements of the New Jerusalem. The first portion 
of the walk was constructed of Chilean flour in one 
hundred pound sacks, and which in one place had 
been pressed down nearly out of sight in the soft 
mud. Then followed a long row of large cooking 
stoves over which it was necessary to carefully pick 
your way, as some of the covers had accidentally 
been thrown off. Beyond these again, and which 
completed the walk, was a double row of boxes of 
tobacco of large size. Although this style of walk 
may seem very extravagant, even to an old pioneer, 
yet at that time sacks of Chilean flour, cooking stoves, 



THE ARGONAUTS 223 

tobacco and pianos were the cheapest materials to 
be found, for lumber was in the greatest demand, 
selling in some instances at $600 per thousand, whilst 
the former articles, in consequence of the great sup- 
ply, were of little value." 

But it was not to live that wild life in San Fran- 
cisco that the Argonauts and those who had survived 
the terrible journey across the plains over trackless 
wastes and encounters with savage peoples, had come. 
The "diggings" were further on among the valleys 
and along the streams of the great hills which beckon- 
ed in the distance. The goldseekers remained in San 
Francisco only long enough to more fully equip 
themselves for the task before them, and this out- 
fitting they performed in feverish haste. They 
leaped from the decks of the ships to the shores of 
the cove of Yerba Buena and were followed in al- 
most every instance by the ship's crew, boatswain 
and mate, captain and all, till the great harbor was 
filled with abandoned and deserted vessels which the 
hard-pushed merchants afterwards lashed to the 
shore, using them as warehouses for the goods and 
supplies which they were selling hand over hand to 
the embryo miners. 

It seemed that the news of the discovery of gold 
in California carried with it some information as 
**to the lay of the land." As a consequence, the 
Argonauts who came around the Horn had prepared 
themselves to a certain extent to meet the conditions 
they were to face. They brought picks and shovels 
and other tools as well as blankets in which to sleep, 
and suitable clothes to wear. They were also in- 
formed that in order to reach the '* diggings" from 
San Francisco, their best route was by the river to 
Sacramento. Not a few managed to bring with them 
material sufficient to build small boats, rafts or 
scows. Others who had not thus prepared them- 



224 CALIFORNIA 

selves, managed to secure passage on the boats wMcli 
plied a regular trade up and down the river ; or else 
they made the journey on mule or horseback, with 
burro or some other land conveyance. If all else 
failed they could walk. Sacramento was the dis- 
tributing point for the mines where everybody gath- 
ered prior to spreading out into the mountains and 
along the creeks in search of fortune. The pioneers 
who crossed the plains came, of course, from an oppo- 
site direction from that taken by the Argonauts, tiU 
it came to pass that these two great migratory tides 
met under the shadows of the great Sierras and their 
minarets of snow in the Land of Gold. 

The first rush was, naturally, for Coloma, where 
Marshall had found the first nugget. This was a 
stampede of Californians who heard the great news 
before it had drifted beyond the mountain peaks and 
across the seas to the outer world. But with the arri- 
val of the Argonauts and the pioneers the same year 
the whole section of the country which is now the 
counties of Calaveras, Nevada, El Dorado, Tuolumne, 
Trinity, Amador, and some other northern Califor- 
nia counties, was covered with gold-seekers whose 
rewards were beyond the dreams of avarice. Such 
famous camps as Hangtown, Poverty Flat, Colum- 
bia Bar, Kelsey, Jacksonville, Pilot Hill and others 
sprang into existence. Grass Valley, Nevada City and 
Placerville (** Hangtown") became important com- 
munities, while Sacramento remained the great dis- 
tributing center and San Francisco the metropolis 
and the great port to which came the eager ships and 
from which they sailed with spoils to the old homes 
far away, where waited anxious and eager hearts for 
the wanderers' return. 

How intense the excitement was and how eagerly 
men responded to the call of California in 1848 are 
eloquently demonstrated by the fact that six months 



THE ARGONAUTS 225 

after Marshall's discovery there were four thousand 
mi Tiers at work hunting for gold on the Sacramento, 
the San Joaquin, the American and Feather Rivers 
and all their branches. The rude log cabins and the 
little camps of the miners were flung under the snow 
peaks of the Sierra Nevada from the upper waters 
of the Feather River southward for a distance of 
four hundred miles. And day after day, week after 
week and month after month, every vessel that en- 
tered the Golden Gate brought hundreds upon him- 
dreds of new gold-seekers, while the now beaten trails 
of plain and desert were vibrant with endless cara- 
vans. The population at the beginning of 1848 was 
not more than 150,000 souls, all told, but the influx 
of newcomers was so large within the next two years 
that California had grown sufficiently peopled to be 
entitled to take her place in the sisterhood of the 
states. 

The mind can easily picture the frenzy of excite- 
ment with which the Argonauts were seized as they 
came into the realization of actual success. The 
man from the stony New England hillside farm, heir 
to generations of grinding and unremunerative toil, 
and all those who had come from lives of little things 
everywhere on earth were now swarming over the 
creeks, ravines and gulches of California like an 
army of ants, overturning boulders and shoveling up 
the sand in their endless quest for the shining dust 
and yellow nuggets which meant sudden and almost 
unbelievable fortune. Let any man of the present 
day who toils and strives incessantly throughout a 
lifetime to amass, as best he may in the fierce and 
bitter struggle of life, the merest competency, imag- 
ine himself as coming suddenly in some wild and out 
of the way place where by overturning a boulder or 
stemming the tide of the waters, he secures between 
daylight and sundown of that one day alone an in- 



226 CALIFORNIA 

dependent fortune, and he can best understand by 
this exercise of his imagination what were the feel- 
ings of the first gold-diggers in California. The 
picture can be no better portrayed than by quoting 
one of the old Argonauts who thus describes his own 
feeUngs when he made his first "strike." 

"I shall never forget," says he, "the delight with 
which I first struck and worked out a crevice. It 
was the second day after our installation in our little 
log hut — the first having been employed in what is 
called 'prospecting' or searching for the most favor- 
able place in which to commence operations. I had 
slung pick, shovel and bar on my shoulder and 
trudged merrily away to a ravine about a mile from 
our house. Pick, shovel and bar did their duty, and 
I soon had a large rock in view. Getting down into 
the excavation I had made and seating myself upon 
the rock I commenced a careful search for a crevice 
and at last found one, extending longitudinally along 
the rock. It appeared to be filled with a hard, bluish 
clay and gravel, which I took out with my knife ; and 
there at the bottom, strewn along the whole length of 
the rock, was bright, yellow gold, in little pieces about 
the size and shape of a grain of barley. Eureka! 
Oh, how my heart beat ! I sat still and looked at it 
some minutes before I touched it, greedily drinking 
in the pleasure of gazing upon gold that was in my 
very grasp and feeling a sort of independent bravado 
in allowing it to remain there. When my eyes were 
sufficiently feasted, I scooped it out with the point 
of my knife and an iron spoon, and, placing it in my 
pan, ran home with it much delighted. I weighed it 
and found that my first day's labor in the mines had 
made me thirty-one dollars richer than I was in the 
morning." 

But such were the opportunities at hand and that 
were to follow that no doubt this same prospector 



THE ARGONAUTS 227 

afterward saw the time that thirty-one dollars as the 
result of one day's work looked very small to him. 

As will be seen from the above statement, the 
first gold-seekers washed out the gold dust by means 
of the *'pan." This was to catch the finer particles 
of gold, or "dust," as it was called. The larger par- 
ticles or nuggets were, of course, picked up without 
resorting to this process. "Panning" consisted of 
using with a sort of circular motion, under water, a 
shejgt-iron dish, shallow and with sloping sides, filled 
with earth. The motion of the pan washed the lighter 
earth over the edges, while the gold, of greater spe- 
cific gravity, became precipitated at the bottom. It 
was on accoimt of this very crude and primitive proc- 
ess that the saying came about that this claim or the 
other, would "pan out" so much or so little, and if a 
man told another that he was working a certain claim 
in a certain district he would usually be asked the 
question: "How does it pan out?" meaning to ask 
whether it was a rich claim or not. 

In line with this we come across the order of an- 
other world-wide saying, namely, "How much can 
you raise in a pinch?" In the days of '49 and after- 
ward, when the placer mine was in its glory in Cali- 
fornia, debts were discharged in gold dust instead of 
the coin of the realm, and it often happened that 
when a man was paying a small grocery bill, or more 
particularly when he was buying a drink of liquor 
at a bar, the attendant who was delivering the goods 
would not take the trouble to weigh the dust, but 
would, instead, insert his thumb and forefinger in 
the miner's buckskin bag and lift a pinch of gold 
dust. So it came to pass that if a man were applying 
for a position as bartender, his ability would be tested 
by the proprietor of a place asking the applicant, 
"How much can you raise in a pinch?" The more 

..I .. 



228 CALIFORNIA 

he could raise, of course, tlie more valuable he would 
become as an employee. 

Of course it was not to be supposed that ingenius 
Americans would long be satisfied with so crude a 
contrivance as the pan. It was not long before the 
*' rocker" made its appearance, a contrivance that 
consisted of a wooden box or trough, something like 
a child's cradle, open at the lower end. At the upper 
end was a hopper, or sieve, or perhaps a piece of 
rawhide in which holes were perforated. Little 
strips of wood were nailed across the wooden bottom 
of the rocker about a foot apart, the gold-bearing 
earth or sand was shoveled into the hopper and, while 
water was poured on it, the contrivance was rocked 
like a cradle. As the dirt and gold dust percolated 
through the sieve at the head of the cradle and flowed 
out the other end, the little wooden cleats caught 
the gold while the water carried the lighter earth 
away with it. Still later ^'sluicing" came into play 
on a large scale, the earth being moved hydraulically, 
and mercury was employed to take up the gold in 
the form of amalgam. 

In a wide open country such as California was in 
1849, and into which thousands of all sorts and con- 
ditions of men were rushing from the four corners 
of the earth in frenzied hunger for gold, the wonder 
is that the strong did not totally overpower the weak 
and that any man, single-handed and alone, was able 
to maintain his rights and the possession of his prop- 
erty and the fruits of his labor against a superior 
force which might desire to supersede him on the 
ground which he held and even go so far as to take 
his life in case of the slightest show of resistance on 
his part. It is to be remembered, however, that 
among the hordes of gold-seekers the dominant force 
was that of American men, born and reared in an 
atmosphere of law and order and decency in distant 



THE ARGONAUTS 229 

portions of the continent. These men soon placed 
themselves in touch with one another, called public 
meetings and formed mining laws and other laws to 
govern themselves and the alien as well. They also 
created a crude but effective code of punishment for 
crime. The thief was flogged in public and mur- 
derers and horse-thieves were hanged to trees. The 
size of a mining claim was fixed to average sixty by 
one hundred feet and every man locating ground was 
obliged to stake it out and regularly have the claim 
numbered and registered. He was tiien as fully pro- 
tected as though the regular army of the TJnited 
States were at his back, no matter how weak he might 
be physically, or how unable in any other way to 
create his own protection. One of the pioneers of 
'49, who afterwards returned to his old home and be- 
came Governor of the State of Illinois, wrote as fol- 
lows concerning law and order in Califomia in the 
* ' Days of Forty-nine ' ' : 

'"There was very little law, but a large amount of 
good order ; no churches, but a great deal of religion ; 
no politics but a large number of politicians; no 
offices, and, strange to say for my countrymen, no 
office-seekers. Crime was rare, for punishment was 
certain. I was present one afternoon, just outside 
the city limits (Nevada City) and saw with painful 
satisfaction, as I now remember, Charley Williams 
whack three of our fellow citizens over the bare back 
twenty-one to forty strokes for stealing a neighbor's 
money. The multitude of disinterested spectators 
had conducted the court. My recollection is that 
there were no attorney's fees or court's charges. I 
think I never saw justice administered with so little 
loss of time or at less expense." 

While it is true that large numbers of the Argo- 
nauts were disappointed and failed to make their 
fortunes, the fact remains that there was no excuse 



230 CALIFORNIA 

for any man who was in the goldfielcls of California 
at any time from 1848 to 1851 not to have made money 
in some way or other. A great many who did make 
it, squandered it and afterwards were as poor as when 
they began. All too many of them were rolling stones 
that gathered no moss. They would settle down upon 
a claim which, though not extremely rich, would have 
paid them well for the working, yet as soon as a tale 
of some richer find reached their ears, they would 
abandon the ground to go in search of vaster and 
more sudden returns. In this manner thousands of 
men wasted their opportunities. Many more to whom 
the chance of fortune at mining did not come could 
have amassed sure and very handsome competencies 
at other occupations, even by working as hired labor- 
ers for those who were successfiilly prosecuting 
claims, wages at the time being very high. Hun- 
dreds of these men returned to their eastern homes 
no better off than when they left them, while others 
of the army of the unsuccessful remained to grow up 
into gray '* old-timers," trading on their memories of 
the great days for a shelter at night, a bite to eat and 
a little something to warm them on the inside. 

But it still remains true that never in all the his- 
tory of the world, since the world began, were so 
many absolutely poor men made opulently rich in 
such an incredibly short space of time. Instances to 
prove this statement are endless. One day a miner 
picked up a nugget at Kelsey which he sold for $4700. 
Not far away from the same spot a nugget worth 
$5236 was found; another worth $5000 was discov- 
ered near by, and it is well authenticated that a nug- 
get worth $9500 was found near Knapp's ranch in 
El Dorado county. Aside from these * 'lucky finds," 
and taking the record only of what was produced in 
the legitimate operations of the placers, there is still 
left a record so opulent in its results that it fairly 



THE ARGONAUTS 231 

staggers the imagination. There is instance after 
instance of a production of $5000 a day made with a 
single rocker. Nine acres of ground at Coon Hollow 
yielded $9,000,000 in gold, or a million dollars to the 
acre. There were a great many large areas of land 
which equaled this yield and a large number of 
smaller areas which exceeded it. In 1848, the year 
of Marshall's discovery, the California gold fields 
added $5,000,000 to the gold supply of the world. 
This amount was increased the next year and each 
succeeding year until, at its climax in 1853, the record 
for the twelve months was $65,000,000, making a 
total of $1,200,000,000 for the five years succeeding 
the discovery. 

In the midst of this widespread and unprecedented 
prosperity, and taking into consideration the fact that 
human nature has been the same at all times and in 
all places, it is not to be wondered at that throughout 
the gold diggings many bad characters were in evi- 
dence and that many crimes were committed. Even 
to this day the crumbHng skeleton of some lost miner 
who met a foul death is f oimd in those old hiUs and 
in lonely ravines. 

While Sacramento and Stockton grew into im- 
portance as distributing centers, and while Nevada 
City, Grass VaUey, PlacerviUe and other camps as- 
sumed the proportion of settled towns and villages, 
San Francisco naturally took its place as the metrop- 
olis of California. It was invariably referred to as 
"The City," a reference which still applies to it in 
all the section of northern California. As in the case 
of all cities, it became the rendezvous of toughs and 
thieves and murderers — men who preferred to lead 
dishonest lives when it would have profited them 
more to have been honest and industrious. As the 
diggings became the lodestone of the fortune-hunters 
of the world, San Francisco became the mecca of the 



232 CALIFORNIA 

parasites who went thither to fasten themselves upon 
the industry of others in order that they might profit 
thereby without exerting themselves. Blacklegs, 
thugs, gamblers, thieves and cutthroats of every de- 
scription foregathered within the portals of the 
Golden Gate and banded themselves together for 
strategy and spoils. Vagabonds from the States, out- 
casts and outlaws from Australia, escaped felons 
from the British Isles were there, soon finding one 
another out and organizing themselves as well for 
mutual protection as for the prosecution of their 
nefarious aspirations. 

These unclean vultures and vampires in human 
form became at once successful in the new El Dorado 
and at length grew so emboldened that they formed 
an organization of their own which bore the entirely 
appropriate title of ''The Hoimds." The organiza- 
tion directed its efforts in the beginning mainly to- 
wards the looting of foreigners from the South 
American countries and the native Mexican popula- 
tion of California. The women who cohabited 
with them, and who were their partners in crime, 
plied their trade of prostitution in order that they 
might the more successfully render assistance. The 
new city, busy by day and night with the business of 
money-making, gave little time to civic organizations 
and thus the better element of its citizenship ''stood" 
for the crimes committed by "The Hounds" without 
murmuring to any great extent and continued to do 
so until the outlaws, in their vast impertinence, be- 
gan to attack, to rob and to murder Americans. 

On the fifteenth day of July, 1849, a large band of 
"The Hounds" returned to San Francisco from a 
marauding expedition in the hills of Contra Costa. 
They paraded the streets of the city in military order, 
armed with firearms and heavy sticks, their leader 
dressed in a showy imif orm, marching at their head. 



THE ARGONAUTS 233 

As they approached a quarter of the town in which 
were encamped in tents a large party of Chileans, 
''The Hounds" savagely attacked the settlement, 
robbed the inmates of everything of value that was 
in their possession and tore down and destroyed the 
tents over their heads. Then as a fitting climax to 
the dastardly outrage, they opened fire with their 
guns and pistols, shooting down and murdering in 
cold blood, men, women and children, indiscrimi- 
nately. This awful outrage was committed in broad 
daylight. "The Hounds" made no attempt to even 
cover their tracks but swaggered vauntingly through 
the streets in the most insulting and threatening 
manner imaginable. 

This latest, most cowardly and bloody outrage of 
**The Hounds," threw San Francisco into a state of 
great excitement. The leading business men, law- 
yers and other substantial citizens among the Ameri- 
can population waited upon the Alcalde or Mavor 
and urged him to take steps to put an end to these 
deplorable conditions. The Alcalde took prompt 
action by issuing a proclamation in which it was 
commanded that the people of the city were to report 
forthwith in Portsmouth Square, at which point the 
whole population seems to have gathered within a 
few hours in response to the command. The meeting 
was duly organized and one of the leading citizens 
addressed the people in no uncertain words. At the 
suggestion of some one a fund for the relief of the 
Chileans was at once organized. Next came the or- 
ganization of a police force. Two hundred and thirty 
men among those present enrolled themselves as con- 
stables, with one man in general command and ten 
others accepting appointments as captains. A hard- 
ware firm of the town furnished the volunteers with 
muskets and on that same afternoon twenty of **The 
Hounds" were arrested and placed under custody on 



234 CALIFORNIA 

a United States warship then lying in the harbor, 
there being no other safe place in which to hold them. 
The leader of ''The Hounds," who had fled the city, 
was apprehended and arrested on the way to Stock- 
ton. 

The people then organized their own court of 
justice and proceeded to try the offenders with due 
formality of law. There were many men of fine 
legal attainments then in San Francisco who had 
abandoned the practice of their profession in the 
States to join the great rush for gold. Several of 
these men were appointed to prosecute the criminals 
on behalf of the people and others were appointed to 
defend them. The trials were conducted with the 
strictest regard to legal procedure and in due course 
of time a regularly organized jury brought in its 
verdict. * ' The Hounds ' ' under arrest were sentenced 
to terms of imprisonment and subjected to fines. 
They were later sent to such prisons as were avail- 
able in California at the time xmder Mexican rule, 
but they were soon afterwards released, and many 
other sentences that were imposed were never carried 
out, but the organization of ''The Hounds" was 
effectively and completely broken up. 

For a time following these trials something like 
law and order held sway in San Francisco, but 
towards the close of 1849 and a year later, also, there 
were tremendous influxes of immigration, carrying 
with them, of course, their quotas of cutthroats, mur- 
derers and general all-around bad men. For a couple 
of years, then, San Francisco again became a very 
undesirable place of residence. The same state of 
affairs existed in Sacramento, Stockton and other 
communities. Murder, arson and robbery became 
most terriblj^ common. The organization that had 
broken up "The Homids" no longer existed and no 
other organization had come to take its place. Now 



THE ARGONAUTS 235 

and then feeble attempts were made to punish of- 
fenders by law, but the criminals invariably escaped. 
Although murder after murder had been committed 
not a single execution was reported. For the fifth 
time San Francisco was burned down at the hands 
of incendiaries. Stockton and Nevada City had also 
suffered in like manner. Things went from bad to 
worse until at length a condition of affairs existed 
which could no longer be endured. 

In June, 1851, to meet this frightful situation, 
there was organized in San Francisco the world- 
famed "Vigilance Committee." 

Into this organization, which was born of dire need, 
the best men of San Francisco entered with alacrity. 
They met in secret and their operations were con- 
ducted in secret. They bound themselves by oath to 
restore law and order to a stricken city. A room was 
selected for their meeting-place in which it was 
agreed that one or more of their members should be 
in constant attendance day and night to receive the 
report of any member of the association or any other 
person or persons whatsoever, of any acts of violence 
done to the person or property of any citizen of San 
Francisco. They further bound themselves that if 
in the judgment of the member of the committee pres- 
ent, the acts reported justified the interference of the 
committee or the prompt and summary punishment 
of the offender, the whole committee was at once to 
be assembled for the purpose of taking such action 
as the majority determined upon. 

The signal agreed upon to call the Vigilantes to- 
gether was two strokes made upon a bell, which was 
repeated with a pause of one minute between each 
alarm. A full board of officers was elected with a 
sergeant-at-arms who kept his constant residence in 
the committee room. There was a standing commit- 
tee of finance and a committee of five on qualifications 



236 CALIFORNIA 

of members to the end that none but respectable citi- 
zens should become members of the ''Vigilantes." 

This wonderful organization, which has been the 
recipient alike of both the highest praise and the 
strongest condemnation for its acts, soon found 
plenty of work to do. In June, 1851, a man named 
John Jenkins entered a store on Long Wharf and 
stole a safe with which he put out upon the bay in a 
boat. He was promptly caught and tried and at 
midnight the bell of the Vigilance Committee on the 
California engine house was tolled. In a few mo- 
ments afterwards, before the assembled populace, 
Jenkins was taken from confinement and promptly 
hanged. Later on all the members of the Vigilance 
Committee boldly published a defense of their action 
in hanging Jenkins, each member affixing his full and 
proper name to the statement. The coroner's jury 
implicated the leading Vigilantes in their verdict of 
the inquest but no action was taken against them. 
While they had no authority of law, they were the 
leading men of the community and there could be no 
dispute about the fact that if they did not restore 
law and order to San Francisco, there was no one 
else to do it. 

From that time on, the Vigilance Committee as- 
sumed authority in San Francisco and ruled with an 
iron hand for the city's good. Thieves and mur- 
derers, one after another, were promptly hanged, im- 
prisoned or driven from the country. In Sacra- 
mento, Stockton, San Jose and other towns, similar 
Committees of Vigilance were organized and acted 
with the same grim determination. The result was 
that California again became a safe place in which 
to live, with the rights of every man fully restored. 
The year 1851 was the year which marked the great- 
est activity of the Vigilantes and, in the light of his- 
tory, the men who formed the organization stand en- 



THE ARGONAUTS 237 

tirely justified. They were, themselves, men of the 
highest integrity and morality, and the service they 
performed was to them not a pleasant but a neces- 
sary duty. 

Long years after the golden days had faded and 
their memories lingered only in the hearts of men 
grown gray, the stirring events of *'The days of '49'* 
were themes for camp-fire stories and for Old 
Pioneer re-unions. The following verses, which were 
simg in the mining camps and the "diggings" long 
before they appeared in print, are perpetuated in 
these days by the Calif ornian society known as ' * The 
Native Sons of the Golden West," the members of 
which have officially adopted the poem as the song of 
their organization : 

We have worked our claims, 
We have spent our gold 

Our barks are astrand on the bars; 
We are battered and old, 
Yet at night we behold 

Outeroppings of gold in the stars. 

Chorus : 

Tho' battered and old. 

Our hearts are bold, 

Yet oft do we repine 
For the days of old, 
For the days of gold, 

For the days of 'Forty-nine. 

Where the rabbits play, 
Where the quail all day 

Pipe on the chaparral hill; 
A few more days. 
And the last of us lays 

His pick aside and all is still. 



238 CALIFORNIA 

We are wreck and stray, 
We are cast away, 

Poor battered old hulks and spars; 
But we hope and pray. 
On the Judgment Day, 

We shall strike it up to the stars. 

After each stanza of the song, the chorus is repeat- 
ed. The words make an eloquent and a true picture. 
There wiU be such days no more on this earth — or, 
perhaps, such men. Doubtless there will be a little 
corner of the New Jerusalem set aside especially for 
the Argonauts who made California wonderful in 
the days of '49. 



IX 

THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 

California came into the sisterhood of the States 
violently, at the mouth of the cannon, with the rattle 
of musketry and accompanied by unfortunate but, 
as it would seem, unavoidable bloodshed. She was 
never a territory of the United States except in 
theory, but entered the Union as a full-fledged state 
almost immediately as she emerged from the control 
of Mexico. She took her place as the thirty-first 
sovereign commonwealth of the Union. The repub- 
lic of the United States was then in the seventy- 
fourth year of its independence. 

The Republic of California, commonly called the 
*'Bear Flag Republic," ceased to exist by the unani- 
mous consent of the Americans who composed it, the 
moment that Commodore John D. Sloat raised the 
Stars and Stripes at Monterey on the morning of 
July 7, 1846. Thus the Bear Flag Republic had 
been in existence twenty-four days. Not only had it 
been the desire but the full intention of the Bear 
Flag people to turn California over to the 
United States had it devolved upon them to perform 
the task of wresting the Province from Mexico. Con- 
sequently the news that came from Monterey was 
exactly the news they wanted to hear. The Bear 
Flag was taken down from every pole and staff upon 
which it floated and was folded away with its short 
but vivid memories to await the judgment of Time. 

It is necessary to clearly understand the situation 
in California as it was on July 7, 1846, the day Sloat 
hoisted the Stars and Stripes over Monterey. To 



240 CALIFORNIA 

begin with, the United States was then at war with 
Mexico. Commodore Sloat raised the flag in accord- 
ance with instructions he had received from the Gov- 
ernment at Washington to seize the Port of San 
Francisco and other ports of California and to hold 
possession of them against Mexico and aU other na- 
tions. But he had no instructions to set up any form 
of government in California on behalf of the United 
States. Don Pio Pico was then the Mexican Civil 
Governor of California and General Jose Castro was 
the Mexican Military Chief. Immediately upon 
landing his men at Monterey and raising the Ameri- 
can flag, Commodore Sloat addressed a letter to Gen- 
eral Castro at San Juan Bautista and also dis- 
patched a message to Governor Pico at Los Angeles. 

In his letter to General Castro, Commodore Sloat 
stated that actual war existed between the United 
States and Mexico, and he called upon Castro to 
surrender his troops, munitions of war and public 
property to the end that bloodshed and the unneces- 
sary sacrifice of human life might be avoided. The 
letter invited Castro to a conference at Monterey in 
order that a capitulation might be arranged, at the 
same time assuring Castro that he would be treated 
with respect and that the safety of himself, his offi- 
cers and his men would be guaranteed. The message 
to Pico was much in the same vein and it also con- 
tained an invitation to the Governor to proceed to 
Monterey for a conference. 

In order to allay the fears of the CaHfornians — 
and by the term *' Calif ornians" is meant the Mexi- 
can inhabitants and not the Americans — and also to 
make his position clear. Commodore Sloat issued a 
proclamation prior to raising the flag at Monterey. 
This proclamation is herewith given as weU for its 
historical value as for the reason that it will serve 
to make clear in the minds of the present-day reader 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 241 

the exact situation at that time, from Sloat's position 
and point of view. 

The proclamation was addressed ''To the Inhabi- 
tants of California" and was as foUows: 

"The central Government of Mexico having com- 
menced hostilities against the United States of 
America by invading its territory and attacking the 
troops on the north side of the Rio Grande, and with 
a force of 7000 men under . . . General Arista which 
army was totally destroyed ... on the 8th or 9th 
day of May last by a force of 2300 men under . . . 
General Taylor, and the City of Matamoras taken. . . 
and the two nations being actually at war by this 
transaction, I shall hoist the standard of the United 
States at Monterey immediately, and shall carry it 
throughout California. I declare to the inhabitants 
of California that, although I come armed with a 
powerful force, I do not come among them as an 
enemy to California ; on the contrary, I come as their 
best friend, as henceforward California will be a por- 
tion of the United States and its peaceful inhabi- 
tants will enjoy the same rights and privileges as 
the citizens of any other portion of that territory 
with all the rights and privileges they now enjoy, 
together with the privilege of choosing their own 
magistrates and other officers for the administration 
of justice among themselves; and the same protec- 
tion will be extended to them as to any other state in 
the Union. They will also enjoy a permanent gov- 
ernment under which life, property and the constitu- 
tional right and lawful security to worship the Crea- 
tor in the way most congenial to each one's sense of 
duty, will be secured, which, unfortunately, the cen- 
tral government of Mexico cannot afford them, de- 
stroyed as her resources are by internal factions and 
corrupt officers, who create constant revolutions to 
promote their own interests and oppress the people. 



242 CALIFORNIA 

Under the flag of the United States California will 
be free from all such troubles and expense; conse- 
quently the country will rapidly advance and im- 
prove both in agriculture and commerce, as, of 
course, the revenue laws will be the same in Cali- 
fornia as in all other parts of the United States, 
affording them all manufactures and produce of the 
United States free of any duty and all foreign goods 
at one-quarter of the duty they now pay. A great 
increase in the value of real estate and the products 
of California may also be anticipated. With the 
great interest and kind feeling I know the Govern- 
ment and the people of the United States possess 
towards the citizens of California, the country can- 
not but improve more rapidly than any other on the 
continent of America. Such of the inhabitants of 
California, whether natives or foreigners, as may not 
be disposed to accept the high privileges of citizen- 
ship and to live peaceably under the Government of 
the United States will be allowed time to dispose of 
their property and to remove out of the coimtry if 
they choose, without any restrictions; or remain in 
it, observing strict neutrality. With full confidence 
in the honor and integrity of the inhabitants of the 
country I invite the judges, alcaldes, and other civil 
officers to retain their offices, and to execute their 
fimctions as heretofore that the public tranquillity 
may not be disturbed, at least until the government 
of the territory can be more definitely arranged. All 
persons holding titles to real estate or in quiet posses- 
sion of lands under a color of right shall have those 
titles and rights guaranteed to them. All churches 
and the property they contain, in the possession of 
the clergy of California, shall continue in the same 
rights and possessions they now enjoy. All provi- 
sions and supplies of every kind furnished by the 
inhabitants for the use of the United States' ships 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 243 

and soldiers will be paid for at fair rates'; and no 
private property will be taken for public use with- 
out just compensation at the moment." 

Pio Pico did not deign to make any answer what- 
ever to the message from Sloat. Castro wrote an 
evasive reply to the letter which he had received from 
the Commodore and at once followed it up by writ- 
ing a letter to Pico at Los Angeles in which he stated 
that he was on his way with one hundred and sev- 
enty men and that he hoped that Governor Pico 
would promptly order all the military to be mobilized 
and all Californians called to arms to defend their 
country against the American invaders. Pico called 
the provincial assembly together, and there was a 
great deal of talk about a determined stand and the 
annihilation of the Americanos, but it amounted to 
nothing. 

At just about this time when all California was 
buzzing like an angry bee hive. Commodore Robert 
P. Stockton arrived in the Port of Monterey with 
the United States Frigate Congress from the Ha- 
waiian Islands. The date was July 15, 1846. Stock- 
ton was heartily welcomed by Commodore Sloat, 
whose health was failing. In addition to his bad 
physical condition it appears that Sloat was men- 
tally sick of the whole California business, although 
he had reason to believe that the American conquest 
of CaHfomia was already a success. Sloat deter- 
mined to leave and he did so on July 29, sailing in 
the Levant for Mazatlan and Panama. He trans- 
ferred his authority to Stockton and left that officer 
in charge of the whole business so far as he was able 
to do so. 

Commodore Stockton got busy at once. As Com- 
mander-in-Chief of the United States forces he issued 
an address to the people of California, verbally at- 
tacking Mexico with fierce invective and charging 



244 CALIFORNIA 

General Castro with ''violating every principle of 
international law and national hospitality by hunt- 
ing and pursuing with several hundred soldiers and 
with wicked intent, Captain Fremont of the United 
States Army, who came to refresh his men, about 
forty in number, after a perilous journey across the 
mountains on a scientific survey, for which repeated 
hostilities and outrages military possession was order- 
ed to be taken of Monterey and San Francisco, until 
redress should be obtained from the Government of 
Mexico." There was a whole lot more in the same 
vein, serving notice on the Calif ornians, in no un- 
equivocal language, that they might as weU prepare 
to throw down their arms and quit. Commodore 
Sloat was not given a copy of the address until he 
was about to sail, and did not read it until he was at 
sea. But when he did read it, he wrote a letter to 
the Secretary of the Navy at Washington, protesting 
against the language used by Stockton and asserting 
that it did not state the situation correctly. 

Thomas O. Larkin, the United States Consul at 
Monterey, counseled Stockton to proceed diplomatic- 
ally, to treat with the Californians and endeavor to 
bring about a peaceful solution of the trouble. But 
Stockton was not the kind of man to act on advice 
of this nature. He sailed to San Pedro to take up 
his position there and, at about the same time, he 
dispatched Fremont to San Diego. Larkin had also 
written to Governor Pio Pico advising him to en- 
deavor to make terms with Stockton. Castro and 
Pico were then together in Los Angeles and they 
sent a delegation to San Pedro to negotiate with 
Commodore Stockton as soon as news of his arrival 
reached them. In this delegation was Jose Maria 
Flores, who very soon afterward became Coman- 
dante General of the California military forces. 
Stockton absolutely decHned to treat with Flores as 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 245 

the ambassador of Castro and Pico or in any other 
capacity. The Californians were bluntly informed 
that they had no standing whatever and that every 
man bearing arms in the Province, other than as a sol- 
dier of the United States, would be treated as a rebel. 

Upon the receipt of the news of Commodore Stock- 
ton 's attitude, emphatic as it was, Governor Pico and 
General Castro concluded that discretion was the 
better part of valor, so far as they were concerned, 
and they immediately set out for Mexico on the same 
day, which was August 10. They did not travel to- 
gether, however, as the old bitter feeling between 
them had not been smoothed over. There had been 
many a bitter political quarrel in California from 
first to last, but it may be said safely that the quarrel 
between Castro and Pico was the bitterest of which 
there is any record. As to the real reason why Pico 
and Castro abandoned the field, it is contended that 
they were not actuated by fear, but by the desire to 
escape inevitable humiliation at the hands of the 
Americans. Everything in the character of General 
Castro gives color to the belief that he was by no 
means a coward and that he was loyal to California 
to his heart's core. He regarded England, Prance 
and the United States equally as the enemies of his 
country and he would have been glad to wipe them all 
from the face of the earth were he able to have done 
so. As to Pico's motives in running away, there 
must always remain more or less doubt. After he 
left he put his friends in danger by forcing them to 
conceal him. His career as a legislator and as a 
Governor of California stamps him all the way 
through as a shifty politician, always scheming for 
his own interests. 

Commodore Stockton had brought Mr. Larkin, the 
Consul, with him to San Pedro. Landing his 
marines for the purpose of marching on Los An- 



246 CALIFORNIA 

geles, Larkin was sent ahead. The Consul found 
that Castro and Pico had fled and, so notifying Stock- 
ton, the Commodore sent a portion of his marines 
back to the ship and continued his march with the 
balance. On the way he was met by Fremont 
with his forces from San Diego. The entire force 
then, with bands playing and banners flying, entered 
Los Angeles without resistance. The American 
standard was raised and Commodore Stockton, in 
another characteristic pronunciamento, declared 
himself Governor of the Territory of California and 
commander of its military forces. He declared his 
intention of organizing a civil government, but be- 
yond declaring himself Governor, he seems not to 
have carried this intention into effect. He appointed 
Fremont military commander of the Territory. 
Leaving Lieutenant Archibald H. Gillespie in com- 
mand at Los Angeles, Stockton returned to Mon- 
terey by sea while Fremont and his force took the 
overland trail northward, the agreement being that 
the two commanders with their forces were to meet 
at San Francisco — then still known as Yerba Buena 
— on October 26. 

The Americans at this time were rather resting 
easy in the belief that the Californians were incapa- 
ble of making even a show of resistance to Stockton's 
program. But that this idea was a mistaken one, 
subsequent events amply proved. Lieutenant Gil- 
lespie's police regulations in Los Angeles were very 
drastic, indeed. It seems that personal liberties 
were greatly restricted. This the Californians in 
Los Angeles naturally resented. It was especially 
resented by a young fellow of rather wild and un- 
manageable disposition whose name was Serbulo 
Varela, together with several of his boon companions. 
They were mostly Sonorans. On the night of the 
twenty-third of September, Varela with about twenty 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 247 

others made an attack on the adobe house in which 
Gillespie's men were quartered. 

The attack does not appear to have been a very 
serious matter and it was probably greatly exag- 
gerated in Gillespie's mind, but be that as it may, 
its effects were serious. As a matter of fact it was 
the torch that set off the magazine of war. In an 
incredibly short space of time the Californians were 
up in arms from one end of the Province to the other 
and the American forces soon found that their sup- 
posed security had been based on mistaken judgment. 

Varela's night attack on Gillespie at Los Angeles 
now assumed the proportions of an armed revolt. 
In a few days Varela himself had gathered together 
an organized force of three hundred men in which 
Castro's veterans assumed places as captains, not- 
withstanding that they were under parole and were 
now forfeiting their lives by the action which they 
were taking. Captain Jose Maria Flores, a man of 
considerable stamina and ability, was made Coman- 
dante General of the revolutionary forces, with Jose 
Antonio Carrillo and Captain Andres Pico next in 
command. They were ready to fight and, as we shall 
see, they did fight. Gillespie realized the seriousness 
of the situation and dispatched a courier to Commo- 
dore Stockton with a full statement of the conditions 
with which he found himself surrounded. 

No step could be taken in California in those days 
unless a prommciamento had first been issued. The 
Spanish and Mexicans, as well as their California 
successors, were master hands in the framing of pro- 
nimciamentos which bristled with sonorous and ex- 
tremely eloquent phrases. The Americans seem also 
to have had a weakness for this kind of document. 
There were so many of them from time to time that 
they become tiresome on the pages of California's 
history. But the pronunciamento framed and posted 



248 CALIFORNIA 

by Serbulo Yarela when he launched his famous re- 
volt against the Americanos in 1846 is rather excep- 
tional and demands reproduction here if only for the 
reason that it reflects the state of feeling which 
the Califomians were in, or which they believed 
themselves to be in. Behold the immortal declara- 
tion of Serbulo Varela and his devoted men : 

** Citizens: For a month and a half, by a lament- 
able fatality resulting from the cowardice and incom- 
petence of the Department chief authorities, we see 
ourselves subjugated and oppressed by an insignifi- 
cant force of adventurers from the U. S. of N. 
America, who, putting us in a condition worse than 
that of slaves, are dictating to us despotic and arbi- 
trary laws by which, loading us with contributions 
and onerous taxes, they wish to destroy our indus- 
tries and agriculture, and to compel us to abandon 
our property, to be taken and divided among them- 
selves. And shall we be capable of permitting our- 
selves to be subjugated, and to accept in silence the 
heavy shame of slavery? Shall we lose the soil in- 
herited from our fathers, which cost them so much 
blood? Shall we leave our families victims of the 
most barbarous servitude ? Shall we wait to see our 
wives violated, our innocent children beaten by the 
American whip, our property sacked, our temples 
profaned, to drag out a life full of shame and dis- 
grace ? No ! a thousand times no, compatriots ! Death 
rather than that I Who of you does not feel his heart 
beat and his blood boil on contemplating our 
situation? Who will be the Mexican that will 
not be indignant and rise in arms to destroy our op- 
pressors? We believe there will be not one so vile 
and cowardly. Therefore, the majority of the in- 
habitants of this district, justly indignant at our 
tyrants, we raise the cry of war, and with arms in 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 249 

our hands, we swear with one accord to support the 
following articles : 

"1. We, all the inhabitants of the Department of 
California, as members of the great Mexican nation, 
declare that it is and has been our wish to belong to 
her alone, free and independent. 

**2. Therefore the intrusive authority appointed 
by the invading forces of the U. S. is held as null 
and void. 

'*3. All North Americans being foes of Mexico, we 
swear not to lay down our arms until we see them 
ejected from Mexican soil. 

*'4. Every Mexican citizen from 15 to 60 years of 
age who does not take up arms to carry out this plan 
is declared a traitor, under penalty of death. 

**5. Every Mexican or foreigner who may directly 
or indirectly aid the foes of Mexico will be punished 
in the same manner. 

**6. All property of resident North Americans, 
who may have directly or indirectly, taken part with 
or aided the enemies of Mexico, will be confiscated 
and used for the expenses of the war, and their per- 
sons will be sent to the interior of the Republic. 

*'7. All who may oppose the present plan will be 
put to death. 

*'8. All inhabitants of Santa Barbara and the 
northern districts will be immediately invited to 
accede to this plan." 

Thus in September of 1846 were the dogs of 
war again unleashed and the sunny hills and valleys 
surveyed by old Mars for another blood-drenching. 

The first battle of the war took place at the Chino 
Rancho about twenty-five miles east of Los Angeles 
in the neighborhood of which Commodore Stockton 
had directed some twenty Americans to keep in close 
touch with one another for the purpose of guarding 
the San Bernardino frontier against the possible re- 



250 CALIFORNIA 

turn of General Castro and an armed force from 
Mexico. 

On September 26-27, 1846, Flores sent Serbulo 
Varela with about fifty men to route the Americans 
at Chino. Jose del Carmen and others, marching from 
the opposite direction, joined forces with Varela. The 
Americans were attacked in the adobe ranch house 
where they had assembled. Neither side was sup- 
plied with much ammunition. The Californians on 
their horses assaulted the house, firing their guns 
from the backs of the animals. The Americans re- 
turned the fire, but the Californians succeeded in 
getting close under the walls of the house and setting 
the roof on fire. The Americans then came out and 
surrendered and were taken prisoners to the camp 
of the Comandante, Flores, just outside of Los 
Angeles. 

The result of the battle was one Californian killed 
and several wounded and three Americans wounded 
seriously. The entire Californian forces now threat- 
ened Gillespie in Los Angeles and, finding themselves 
in a serious situation, the Americans withdrew from 
their quarters and posted themselves on Fort Hill. 
They were outnmnbered ten to one by the enemy. 
The Californians, though short of ammunition, had 
splendid horses which they rode splendidly, and they 
were flushed with their victory at Chino. Above all, 
they were thirsting to revenge the death of their com- 
rade who had been killed in the recent fight. 

Flores called on Gillespie to surrender, pointing 
out to the Americans that their situation was hope- 
less and that any resistance offered on their part 
could result only in an unnecessary sacrifice of 
human life. The Californian Commander offered to 
permit Lieutenant Gillespie and his men to withdraw 
with their colors and arms and all the honors of war. 
Flores also offered an exchange of prisoners. These 



THE AMEKICAN CONQUEST 251 

terms Gillespie finally accepted and departed for 
San Pedro with Ms forces, accompanied by the ex- 
changed American prisoners and several American 
residents. Four or five days later the Americans 
embarked on the American ship Vandalia, on board 
of which they remained in the harbor awaiting in- 
structions from the north. 

The courier sent out by Gillespie from Los Angeles 
found Commodore Stockton at San Francisco, and 
the news appeared to alarm him. Certainly the Com- 
modore was surprised, since he had but a short time 
before officially declared that the conquest of Cali- 
fornia was complete, the country at peace and all 
that remained for him to do was to establish a civil 
government. He now saw that he had counted his 
chickens before they were hatched. He resolved 
upon immediate action. Ordering Fremont to pro- 
ceed by water to Santa Barbara, Stockton then pre- 
pared to sail with a force to San Pedro for the relief 
of Gillespie and the recapture of Los Angeles. 

On the way down the coast the ship Sterling, in 
which Fremont with one hundred sixty men had set 
sail, met the Vandalia from San Pedro, and Fre- 
mont then learned of the situation at Los Angeles. 
Taking matters in his own hands, as he frequently 
had done before, he determined to return to Mon- 
terey. The ship met with bad weather and when it 
got to Monterey Fremont's men were half starved. 
There forces were joined by other Americans and, 
proceeding to San Juan Bautista, he began his march 
southward on November 26, the army consisting of 
about five hundred men, fairly well mounted and 
equipped with muskets in addition to four brass field- 
pieces. 

In the meantime, as Stockton was sailing for San 
Pedro, he was informed that Monterey, which he 
believed to be unprotected, was threatened with at- 



252 CALIFORNIA 

tack, so he hastened to that point and sent Captain 
Mervine on to San Pedro. Upon reaching San 
Pedro, on October 6, Mervine 's forces, joined by 
those of Gillespie, numbering all told about three hun- 
dred fifty men, landed and proceeded to attack 
the Californians at Los Angeles. When they had 
proceeded about half way on the road they were met 
by a party of Californians. A fight ensued in which 
the Americans were defeated with the loss of five 
men kiUed and several wounded. The Californians 
had a cannon hitched to some horses which they would 
fire and then retreat, and then fire again. The 
Americans tried in vain to capture this cannon, but 
finally retreated to San Pedro where they embarked 
on board the Savannah to wait for Stockton. 

A few days afterward Stockton arrived and, after 
a conference, determined to sail with the whole ex- 
pedition to San Diego, having doubtless been con- 
vinced that the Californians were not to be so easily 
whipped as he had supposed. His plan was to secure 
a safer anchorage for the ships in the harbor of San 
Diego and after a thorough reorganization at that 
port, march his forces up through the interior and 
prosecute the war by land. 

While Stockton was busy with his preparations for 
a campaign at San Diego he was surprised, on De- 
cember 3, by the appearance in his camp of a man 
named Stokes who had come from Warner's Ranch, 
about forty-five miles to the north, with a message 
from General Stephen W. Kearney of the United 
States Army. Kearney's message to Stockton was 
as f oUows : 

"Headquarters, Army of the West, Camp at War- 
ners, Dec. 2, 1846. Sir. I this afternoon reached 
here, escorted by a party of the First Regiment of 
Dragoons. I came by order of the pres. of the U. 
S. We left Santa Fe on the 25th Sept., having taken 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 253 

possession of N. Mex., annexed it to the U. S., estab- 
Hslied a civil govt, in that territory and secured order, 
peace and quietness there. If you can send a party 
to open communication with us on the route to this 
place and to inform me of the state of affairs in Cal. 
I wish you would do so and as quickly as possible. 
The fear of this letter falling into Mexican hands 
prevents me from writing more. Your express by 
Mr. Carson was met on the Del Norte and your mail 
must have reached Washington ten days since. You 
might use the bearer, Mr. Stokes, as a guide to con- 
duct your party to this place. Very respectfully, 
etc." 

In an era that was without railroads or telegraph 
lines in the west, and the Government at Washing- 
ton with the Mexican War on its hands, it is easy to 
understand that Stockton and Fremont were with- 
out information concerning what was going on at 
Washington in regard to California. Both Stockton 
and Fremont at the beginning of December, 1846, 
knew only that they were on the ground to hold Cali- 
fornia for the United States and this they were doing 
to the best of their ability. Kearney's presence in 
California was explained in his instructions which 
he had received at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, in 
June. In order that the present-day reader of this 
history may understand the conditions under which 
General Kearney had come to California, the in- 
structions of the Secretary of War to him are here- 
with given, as follows : 

"It has been decided," said the Secretary of War 
in his instructions to Colonel Kearney at Fort Leav- 
enworth, "by the pres. to be of the greatest import- 
ance in the pending war with Mex. to take the earliest 
possession of Upper Cal. An expedition with that 
view is hereby ordered and you are designated to 
command it. To enable you to be in sufficient force 



254 CALIFORNIA 

to conduct it successfully, this additional force of 
1000 mounted men has been provided to follow you 
in the direction of Sta Fe. . . When you arrive at 
Sta Fe with the force already called and shall take 
possession of it, you may find yourself in a condition 
to garrison it with a small part of your command, as 
the additional force will soon be at that place and 
with the remainder press forward to Cal. . . It is 
understood that a considerable number of American 
citizens are now settled on the Sacramento River, 
near Sutter's establishment called New Helvetia, who 
are well disposed towards the U. S. Should you, on 
your arrival, find this to be the true state of things, 
you are authorized to organize and receive into the 
service of the U. S. such portions of these citizens as 
you may think useful to aid you to hold possession of 
the country. You will, in that case, aUow them so far 
as you shall judge proper, to select their own officers. 
A large discretionary power is invested in you in re- 
gard to these matters as weU as to all others. . . The 
choice of routes by which you will enter Cal. will be 
left to your better knowledge. . . It is expected that 
the Naval forces of the U. S., which are now, or soon 
will be in the Pacific, will be with you in the con- 
quest of Cal. . . Should you conquer and take posses- 
sion of N. Mex. and Cal. or considerable places in 
either, you wiU establish temporary civil government 
therein, abolishing all arbitrary restrictions that may 
exist, so far as it may be done with safety. . . You 
may assure the people of those provinces that it is 
the wish and design of the U. S. to provide for them 
a free govt, with the least possible delay, similar to 
that which exists in our territory. . . The rank of 
Brevet Brigadier-General will be conferred on you 
as you commence your movement towards Cal." 

In pursuance of these instructions Kearney had 
proceeded to New Mexico, maintaining his headquar- 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 255 

ters in the old City of Santa Fe, and had established 
civil government, leaving the country in peace and 
quietness, as he stated in his message from Warner's 
Ranch to Commodore Stockton at San Diego. It 
was on September 25, 1846, that he left Santa Fe for 
California. He had with him three hundred men of 
the First Dragoons. They struck down the valley 
of the Rio Grande and marched on over mountain 
and desert through a wonderfully beautiful, yet deso- 
late land, experiencing Little of interest until October 
6, when they reached a point about thirteen miles 
below the present town of Soccorro, New Mexico. 
At that point, something of very great interest in- 
deed, happened. As though they had sprung out of 
the ground, Kit Carson, the famous scout and trap- 
per, with fifteen men, including six Delaware In- 
dians, stood face to face in that vast wilderness with 
Kearney and his troopers. 

The presence of Carson on that spot was soon ex- 
plained to General Kearney. The wonderful old 
frontiersman whose name has been familiar to many 
generations of American boys, was on his way to 
Washington with dispatches from Commodore Stock- 
ton. Probably General Kearney had never seen Kit 
Carson before and, as the gaimt trooper now looked 
down from his jaded charger on the famous scout 
and hunter, he saw a small, stoop-shouldered man 
with reddish hair, freckled face and soft blue eyes, 
who spoke in monosyllables. There was nothing in 
the man's modest demeanor or his physical makeup 
to indicate the prowess which had made his name a 
household word throughout the continent. He had 
but lately added to his fame by the daring and pic- 
turesque part he had taken in the Bear Flag war. 

When Carson left Los Angeles bearing Stockton's 
dispatches to the seat of Government at Washington, 
everything in California was quiet. Carson believed 



256 CALIFOENIA 

that the conquest had already been achieved and he 
so informed General Kearney. Bringing the inter- 
view to an end, Carson informed Kearney that he 
desired to proceed with the delivery of the dispatches 
in his possession. He had agreed to be back in Cali- 
fornia within one hundred and forty days from the 
day he started from Los Angeles. But General 
Kearney was not willing to lose the opportunity to 
attach to his expedition so valuable a guide and ad- 
visor as Kit Carson. He induced the scout to send 
the dispatches forward by those who had accompa- 
nied him, and return with the dragoons to California. 
To this Carson reluctantly agreed, and under his 
assurances that California was not offering resistance 
to American authority. General Kearney sent back 
two hundred of his men imder Major Sumner to 
Santa Fe, proceeding with the remaining one hun- 
dred on the march and arriving at Warner's Ranch 
on the California frontier, December 2, 1846, as has 
been stated. 

Upon receipt of Kearney's message. Commodore 
Stockton detailed Lieutenant Archibald Gillespie 
with a body of volunteers to make connections with 
the newly arrived force for the purpose of conduct- 
ing it into San Diego. Gillespie and Kearney met 
at a place known as Santa Maria, which is distant 
from San Diego about forty miles. From Gillespie 
General Kearney learned that the Calif ornians were 
in open and active revolt, being in possession of Los 
Angeles and occupying various other points in the 
field with armed and organized forces. 

At this time Captain Andres Pico with about one 
hundred men was in the neighborhood of San Luis 
Rey Mission on the watch for Stockton's expected 
advance from San Diego. Pico's instructions from 
Flores, the Comandante at Los Angeles, were to 
impede the American advance as much as possible, 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 257 

should it take place, the plan of the Californians 
being that Flores with the main body of his army 
should move south to Pico's assistance as events 
might make it necessary. 

Now, when Captain Gillespie came up from San 
Diego to meet Kearney, Pico learned of the move 
and prepared for an opportunity to pounce on the 
Americans and either annihilate them or take them 
prisoners. Pico had no knowledge of Kearney's 
presence in California. For the purpose of getting 
a chance to take advantage of Gillespie, Pico and his 
mounted lancers began to reconnoiter and the Amer- 
icans became aware of his movements. On the night 
of December 5, Kearney learned that Pico's forces 
were camped ten miles distant at the Indian village 
of San Pasqual. Instead of making his way to San 
Diego without inviting difficulties, General Kearney 
determined for some strange reason to attack Pico 
at San Pasqual, going out of his way to do so. Per- 
haps Kearney thought that he might as weU begin 
the task which he had been sent to California to per- 
form, or perhaps he thought he would create some 
diversion for his troopers by frightening the Califor- 
nians whom Kit Carson told him were cowards. But, 
whatever the reason that actuated him may have been, 
subsequent events amply proved that Kearney made 
a mistake in bringing about the famous battle of San 
Pasqual. 

It was the bloodiest fight that ever took place on 
California soil. The battle began in the grey of the 
morning. The air was bitter with winter's cold. It 
had rained in torrents all the night before and the 
American dragoons were benumbed and drenched to 
the skin. Only that portion of Kearney's forces 
which Captain Gillespie had brought up from San 
Diego were fresh and fit for battle. The dragoons 
who had marched with Kearney across plain and 



258 CALIFORNIA 

desert from Santa Fe were worn and jaded from the 
terrible journey. The mules they rode were stif- 
fened and sore and half starved. The horses that 
Kearney had picked up on the Colorado were for the 
most part unbroken and quite unmanageable. On 
the other hand, the enemy were perhaps the best 
horsemen in the world and were moimted on horses 
as fine as were ever bred. 

When morning broke, the Americans found them- 
selves upon a hilltop looking down into the village of 
San Pasqual. They saw Captain Pico and his CaH- 
fomians there encamped and it was at once decided 
to charge upon them. The charge was made by Cap- 
tain Johnson with twenty men at fuU gallop. Pico 
did not see the remainder of Kearney's forces and, 
thinking that he had to contend with only twenty 
horsemen, he ordered his CaHfornians to make a 
stand, which they did, discharging the few muskets 
and pistols in their possession and waiting with their 
lances set for the advancing shock. The Califor- 
nians were compelled to depend ahnost wholly upon 
their lances, but the musket fire was not without re- 
sults. Captain Johnson of the dragoons fell dead 
from a bullet through his head and one of his men 
fell beside him badly hurt. At this, the Americans 
fell back a little, whereupon Kearney's main force 
appeared, at the sight of which Pico and his Cali- 
fornians turned and fled. 

Seeing the Californians in fuU flight, the Ameri- 
cans galloped after them pell-meU. Had they known 
the tactics which the Californians invariably em- 
ployed in battle, there is no doubt that Kearney's 
pursuit would have been less precipitate and certain- 
ly it would have been more cautious, but as it was, 
no caution whatever was exercised. The American 
forces were soon badly elongated for the reason that 
the troopers mounted on the good horses got far in 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 259 

advance, while those mounted on the old, stiff and 
half -starved mules trailed away in the rear. And 
this was exactly the situation that Captain Pico 
desired. 

Suddenly the Californians wheeled around and 
came back on plunging horses at the Americans. 
The Americans fired, but with little or no effect, per- 
haps because many of the guns were ineffective from 
the rain in which they had been drenched the night 
before. Kearney had a howitzer to which a mule 
had been hitched, but the mule became unmanage- 
able and ran away with the gun, dragging it fairly 
within the lines of the Californians, who promptly 
captured both gun and mule as well as the giinner. 

Pico's men now fell upon the Americans in fierce 
charge with their lances against which the sabers and 
the clubbed guns of Kearney's dragoons proved quite 
unavailing. For perhaps a quarter of an hour the 
bloody hand-to-hand conquest was waged. The 
Americans stood their ground with desperate valor, 
but it was not until two additional howitzers had been 
brought up from the rear that the Californians again 
retreated from the slaughter. 

Relieved of the enemy, General Kearney was given 
opportunity to survey the field of his pathetic defeat. 
He himself had been twice wounded in the battle. 
Three of his officers and fifteen men lay dead before 
him. Three more were fatally wounded, nineteen 
others were grievously hurt and one man was miss- 
ing. Except Captain Johnson, all the dead had been 
kiUed by the lances of the Californians, and the 
wounded had been hurt in the same way. The bodies 
of both dead and wounded showed many lance cuts. 
In the fight Kit Carson had been unhorsed and his 
gim broken, but he came through without serious 
injury. 

As the roll was called there was yet one other man 

..J .. 



260 CALIFORNIA 

in the shattered ranks whose head was bloody but 
unbowed. This man was Captain Archibald Gilles- 
pie. He is especially mentioned here as indeed he 
should be, not alone for the valorous part he bore 
in the battle of San Pasqual, but for many other 
noble though unheralded services which he rendered 
the nation in California. His country owed him 
much. He was one of those men who were always 
chosen to bear the burden when it was heavy and to 
take the risk when it was great. When Fremont was 
wandering nobody knew where, in unknown moun- 
tains and over the trackless plains in California, 
Gillespie had been sent to find him and he did find 
him where ten thousand other men would have failed. 
In the face of no duty did he ever shirk, and no mes- 
sage was ever put into his hand by his superior that 
he failed to deHver, no matter how great the hazard 
or how terrible the danger. Throughout aU the 
pages of the history of California that record the 
stirring deeds of the adventurous year of 1846, the 
name of Archibald Gillespie appears, yet he seems 
to have been little marked by the historian and no- 
body seems ever to have thought to honor him, though 
many have been honored whose services were much 
less than his. He was strong and brave and well 
beloved by those who shared the dangers with him. 
The records of the battle of San Pasqual do not 
show that any of the Californians were killed. 
Andres Pico, however, did not make an effort to im- 
prove his victory. When night came he had flung 
his forces southward and was encamped between San 
Pasqual and San Diego, as though to again fight if 
Kearney attempted to join Commodore Stockton's 
forces. The Americans felt themselves to be in des- 
perate straits and their one thought was to get a 
messenger through to San Diego for reinforcements. 
To carry this message was a hazardous undertaking, 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 261 

but Kit Carson, with two companions, successfully 
accomplished the task. Commodore Stockton imme- 
diately sent out a force to Kearney's relief. After 
some unimportant skirmishing Pico and his Califor- 
nians withdrew from the scene and thus Kearney 
was permitted to reach San Diego without further 
molestation. 

There can be no doubt that the victory at San 
Pasqual — for victory it really was — flushed the Cali- 
fornians and helped to create in their minds the 
greatly mistaken idea that they could withstand and 
even repulse the Americans to an extent that the in- 
vaders would finally abandon the attempt to conquer 
California. Captain Andres Pico dispatched a mes- 
senger to Los Angeles and the Commander-in-Chief, 
Flores, was awakened at four o'clock in the morning 
to receive the ''glorious" news. In words that were 
at once airy and contemptuous and worthy of Csesar 
writing from Gaul an account of a skirmish between 
the short swords of his veterans and a covey of naked 
savages, Captain Pico informed the Comandante 
Flores that "the victory was gained without other 
casualty on our side than eleven wounded, none seri- 
ously, since the action was decided a pura arma 
blanca. ' ' On the other hand, General Kearney in his 
report appears to have believed that the Americans 
didn't get the worst of the battle, by any means. 
"The number of their dead and wounded," said 
Kearney, "must have been considerable, though I 
have no means of ascertaining how many, as just 
previous to their final retreat they carried off all 
excepting six. ' ' But the General was mistaken. He 
had inflicted no harm worth mentioning on the Cali- 
fornians. 

It must have been a sad scene as the Americans 
buried their dead in the darkness of the night fol- 
lowing the battle. The bodies of the slain troopers, 



262 CALIFORNIA 

cruelly torn by the lances of Pico's splendid horse- 
men, were left lying in the soft mold of the warm 
California earth under the solemn and drooping 
branches of a willow tree east of the camp. At a 
later day the remains of the heroic dead were re- 
moved to San Diego and laid to rest in quiet graves 
that are now long since forgotten. 

About three weeks prior to the battle of San Pas- 
qual there had been a desperate fight at a place called 
Natividad, a few miles northeast of the present city 
of Salinas. Captain Charles Burroughs, an American 
who had recently arrived in California, and five other 
Americans were killed in this encoimter and five or 
six more were badly wounded. The American loss 
may have been even greater than this. The Califor- 
nians were commanded by Don Manuel Castro, a 
brother of the famous General Castro who had fled to 
Mexico and from whom the Calif ornians were always 
vaguely hoping for help. The tactics employed at 
Natividad by the Californians were about the same 
as those employed by Andres Pico and his men at 
San Pasqual, later on. Natividad was not nearly so 
great a victory for the Californians as San Pasqual, 
but it was an encounter which, like that at Chino 
and skirmishes at other places, led the Californians 
into the error of supposing that in their own way 
and by their own methods they could finally drive 
the Americans out at the points of their lances. 

After San Pasqual, when the forces of Kearney and 
Stockton united at San Diego, and Fremont, who had 
by this time received his commission as Lieutenant- 
Colonel in the United States Army, was on his way 
south with his riflemen, the tide quickly turned 
against the Californians. 

On December 29, 1846, the combined forces of 
Commodore Stockton and General Kearney marched 
from San Diego to advance on Los Angeles. The 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 263 

army consisted of about six hundred men traveling 
on foot with the exception of Captain Gillespie's 
volunteer riflemen, who were mounted. The impedi- 
menta were carried in ten ox-carts, additional oxen 
as well as food supplies being picked up on the way. 
Commodore Stockton, himself, has left us the fol- 
lowing brief but vivid description of the appearance 
of the expedition. 

''Our men were badly clothed," said he, ''and their 
shoes generally made by themselves out of canvas. 
It was very cold and the roads heavy. Our animals 
were all poor and weak, some of them giving out 
daily, which gave much hard work to the men in 
dragging the heavy carts, loaded with ammunition 
and provisions, through deep sands and up steep 
ascents, and the prospect before us was far from 
being that which we might have desired ; but nothing 
could break down the fine spirit of those under my 
command, or cool their readiness and ardor to per- 
form their duties ; and they went through the whole 
march of one himdred and forty miles with alacrity 
and cheerf uhiess. " 

While on the march Stockton and Kearney re- 
ceived word that Fremont with his battalion was 
marching on Los Angeles from the north and that 
the Californians, six hundred strong, were on the 
way to meet him and give him battle. It may be that 
this information was brought by three men from Los 
Angeles who came down to meet Stockton and Kear- 
ney for the purpose of arranging a truce. They came 
from the Comandante Flores. Commodore Stockton 
told these men, one of whom was WiUiam Workman, 
an American, that he could not negotiate with Flores 
because of the fact that that gentleman had broken 
his parole as a Mexican officer. Stockton told the 
delegation that if he could catch Flores he would 
have him shot. The Americans passed through San 



2(54 CALIFORNIA 

Luis Rey, San Juan Capistrano and where now the 
present city of Santa Ana is, and on January 8, 
reached the lower ford of the San Gabriel river. 
Here the Californians appeared and opposed the 
advance. 

Having reason to believe that his advance would 
be easier at the upper ford of the San Gabriel, Stock- 
ton 's forces swerved to the right to the point men- 
tioned. Here, however, the Americans found the 
Californians well prepared for them. Flores had 
five himdred men posted on a bluff above the river 
with two cannons commanding the ford. Two squad- 
rons of horsemen under Andres Pico and Manuel 
Garcias were stationed on the right and another 
squadron on the left under Jose Antonio Carrillo. 
A hot fight ensued. Lieutenant Emery, who was a 
member of Kearney's force and who afterwards 
wrote a good deal about California, states that Kear- 
ney ordered the guns unlimbered before crossing the 
ford, which was undoubtedly the most prudent 
course, but Stockton countermanded the order. Half 
way across, Kearney sent a message that it would be 
impossible to pull the guns through as there was 
quicksand, but Stockton dismounted, seized the ropes 
and declared, "quicksand or no quicksand, the 
guns shall pass over." There was the hottest kind of 
fighting for a matter of two days on the San Gabriel ; 
no end of powder was burned and shot poured from 
the muskets and cannon, yet the casualties were very 
slight. There were only two Americans killed and 
two Californians. Eight Americans were wounded, 
but how many Californians were wounded is not 
known. 

Finally, on the morning of the tenth of January, 
three men from Los Angeles came to Stockton's camp 
under a flag of truce and with a message that no fur- 
ther resistance would be made. A few hours later 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 265 

the American forces entered the city in military 
order with flying colors and the band playing. Com- 
modore Stockton, as Governor and Commander-in- 
Chief, in his orders the following day, congratulated 
the "officers and men of the southern Division of 
U. S. forces in California on the brilliant victory 
obtained by them over the enemy, and upon once 
more taking possession of the Ciudad de Los An- 
geles." At the same time Stockton wrote a brief 
report to the Secretary of War at Washington, in 
which he said : "We have rescued the country from 
the hands of the Insurgents, but I fear that the ab- 
sence of Colonel Fremont's Battalion will enable 
most of the Mexican officers who have broken their 
parole to escape to Sonora." 

From this report it will be seen that Fremont had 
not yet reached Los Angeles. Inquiring as to his 
whereabouts we find that he left Santa Barbara on 
January 3, 1847, seven days before Stockton and 
Kearney recaptured and entered Los Angeles. On 
January 9 he was in camp at San Fernando and 
there he received a letter from Stockton which was 
dated at San Luis Rey, January 3. It was indeed a 
very interesting communication, showing that the 
Americans, while fearless and no doubt fully confi- 
dent of their ability, had at the same time a whole- 
some respect for certain qualifications which the Cal- 
if ornians possessed in the art of warfare. The letter 
was as follows : 

"My dear Colonel: We arrived here last night 
from S. Diego, and leave today on our march for the 
City of the Angels, where I hope to be in five or six 
days. I learn this morning that you are at Sta. Bar- 
bara, and send this dispatch by way of S. Diego, in 
the hope that it may reach you in time. If there is. 
one single chance for you, you had better not fight 
the rebels imtil I get up to aid you, or you can join 



266 CALIFORNIA 

me on the road to the Pueblo. These feUows are 
well prepared, and Mervine and Kearney's defeat 
have given them a deal more confidence and courage. 
If you do fight before I see you, keep your forces in 
compact order. Do not allow them to be separated, 
or even unnecessarily extended. They will probably 
try to deceive you by a sudden retreat or pretend to 
run away and then unexpectedly return to the charge 
after your men get into disorder in the chase. My 
advice to you is to allow them to do all the charging 
and running and let your rifles do the rest. In the 
art of horsemanship, of dodging and running, it is 
vain to attempt to compete with them.'' 

With Stockton and Kearney in full possession of 
Los Angeles and Fremont encamped in the old Mis- 
sion San Fernando, a few miles away, the Califor- 
nians gave up aU hope and tried to make the best 
terms they could with the conquerors. They seemed 
to think they would fare better with Fremont and 
accordingly they sent a delegation to him from their 
hiding places in the hills. Fremont received the 
messengers courteously and gave them to understand 
that he would accept their surrender. He moved his 
forces southward through the Cahuenga pass to a 
point which was probably the outskirts of Hollywood, 
and there on January 13, 1847, the famous treaty of 
capitulation was signed, bearing the signatures of 
Colonel John C. Fremont as Commander of the 
American forces on the ground, and of Andres Pico, 
Comandante of the CaHfornian forces. Flores, the 
Californian Commander-in-Chief, was not present, 
he having turned over the command to Andres Pico 
just before this meeting and, taking to his heels, had 
fled to the far-away haven of Sonora. 

The treaty was drawn up in both Spanish and Eng- 
lish and stipulated that the Californians should de- 
liver up their artillery and public arms, return peace- 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 267 

ably to their homes, conform to the laws and regula- 
tions of the United States and aid and assist in plac- 
ing the country in a state of peace and tranquillity. 
Colonel Fremont on his part guaranteed the Califor- 
nians protection of life and property whether on 
parole or otherwise. 

Colonel Fremont sent the docinnent to General 
Kearney at Los Angeles and the next day proceeded 
with his forces to that city. The war was at an end. 

Many bitter controversies and wretched quarrels 
grew out of the conflicting claims of the various mili- 
tary and naval officers who participated in the con- 
quest of California, and out of the maze of testimony, 
pro and con, it is difficult to determine who was right 
and who was wrong. Indeed, in the light of the 
evidence furnished from many sources it appears 
that there was a measure of justice in the claims of 
both the military and naval authorities in California. 
Kearney and Stockton, Fremont and Mason were aU 
men of action and ambition. California was a long 
way from the seat of government. Instructions had 
been issued from both the War and Navy Depart- 
ments at Washington to respective officers. Had 
there been greater unity of action at Washington, 
and clearer expression of the President's wishes 
with respect to the occupation of California, it is 
probable that much of the friction which sprung up 
on the Pacific might have been avoided. 

It appears clear that Kearney, whose instructions 
have been heretofore quoted, made known to Stock- 
ton at San Diego that he felt himself authorized to 
assume supreme authority in California. Stockton 
later testified that he offered to relinquish authority 
at San Diego and that Kearney declined or neglected 
to assume it. Kearney was then suffering from 
wounds inflicted at San Pasqual and had lost several 
of his officers and men who had marched across the 



268 CALIFORNIA 

plains with him, and to whom he must have been 
deeply attached. Doubtless the physical and men- 
tal conditions produced by these facts and his reali- 
zation that Stockton had a large naval force and had 
really made considerable headway in the occupation 
of California, led Kearney to defer the assumption 
of the authority with which his instructions vested 
him. In any event Stockton assumed full command 
of the forces in the march to Los Angeles and con- 
tinued the extension of his claims as Governor. 
Kearney, on reaching Los Angeles, began to resent 
Stockton's assumption of authority, and with this 
attitude on his part came a more determined position 
on the part of Stockton. 

Fremont, who was approaching Los Angeles, re- 
ported to Kearney on learning that Kearney was at 
Los Angeles, but upon the signing of the treaty at 
Cahuenga (Hollywood), perhaps suspicioning that 
there might be a clash of authority, he sent an officer 
to Los Angeles with the treaty, instead of immedi- 
ately going himself. Kearney at last formally re- 
quested Stockton to exhibit his authority for the pro- 
posed organization of a civil government, stating that 
if he was without such authority he must demand that 
Stockton cease his activities in that line. Stockton 
replied that a civil government had been established 
before the arrival of Kearney, and that he would not 
yield to Kearney's request. He at once suspended 
or attempted to suspend Kearney from command of 
the forces at Los Angeles. So far as the order re- 
lated to sailors and marines, he probably was within 
his powers. Kearney then exhibited his authority 
from the War Department to Fremont and issued 
certain instructions regarding the management of 
troops under Fremont's command. Fremont refused 
to obey on the grounds that he had accepted his in- 
structions from Stockton, had been appointed Gov- 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 269 

emor of California by Stockton and that he recog- 
nized Stockton as having superior authority. Find- 
ing himself without power to enforce his instructions 
and commands, Kearney at once marched with his 
dragoons back to San Diego, four days after the sign- 
ing of the treaty at Cahuenga. 

A battalion of Mormon volunteers, three hundred 
strong, had now arrived at San Diego, and these 
troops were left at San Luis Rey while Kearney 
sailed for Monterey. At Monterey Kearney found 
Commodore W. Branford Shubrick, who had ar- 
rived on January 22, to succeed Stockton. Commo- 
dore Shubrick had already addressed a communica- 
tion to Fremont, not knowing of General Kearney's 
presence in California. Stockton, on January 19, 
left Fremont in charge at Los Angeles, having com- 
missioned him Governor, and sailed north. Stock- 
ton had also appointed a Legislative Council on the 
sixteenth, but no session of that body was ever held, 
due principally to the unwillingness of those selected 
to serve. For a period of about fifty days Fremont 
was recognized by a portion of the population of 
California, at least, as Governor. 

On February 12, Colonel Richard B. Mason ar- 
rived in San Francisco with instructions from Wash- 
ington which clearly indicated that the senior officer 
of the land forces was to be Civil Governor. Mason 
was sent to succeed Kearney, as soon as Kearney 
could shape matters to leave. Commodore Shubrick, 
who had succeeded Stockton and who had already 
recognized Kearney's authority, now joined Mason 
in a public statement wherein Mason was declared 
to be Governor and Monterey the capital. On March 
2, Commodore Biddle arrived to succeed Shubrick. 
All officers, naval and military, with the exception 
of Stockton and Fremont, were acting in harmony. 
About this time there arrived at San Francisco the 



270 CALIFORNIA 

first detachment of a regiment sent out under Col- 
onel Stevenson from New York. 

General Kearney, now having adequate moral and 
military support, sent instructions to Fremont and 
other officers in command in the south. Among 
other things, Fremont was directed to report at Mon- 
terey. After instructing Captain Owens, in com- 
mand of the 'battalion at San Gabriel, to refuse to 
obey any instructions that might reach him from any 
source save himself, Fremont left for Monterey, ar- 
riving there on March 25. On the same evening in 
the company of Thos. O. Larkin he paid a formal 
call on Kearney. The next day an interview was 
arranged between Kearney and Fremont. Fremont 
objected to the presence of Colonel Mason. At this 
point Kearney demanded that Fremont state whether 
he intended to obey his orders or not. Fremont left 
Kearney's presence without committing himself, but 
later in the day expressed a willingness to obey in- 
structions, having first tendered his resignation from 
the army, which was refused. Fremont then re- 
turned to Los Angeles. Mason followed early in 
April and called on Fremont for a list of appoint- 
ments made by him and for all records, civil and 
military, in his possession. Before leaving Los An- 
geles, Colonel Mason became involved in a quarrel 
with Fremont which led to a challenge for a duel 
which was never fought, though both parties doubt- 
less had the spirit and courage to end their difficul- 
ties in that manner. 

After much friction between Fremont and the offi- 
cers in the north, General Kearney on May 31, with 
an escort, left Monterey for Washington by a north- 
ern route. Under orders of Kearney, Fremont was 
required to accompany him. Fort Leavenworth was 
reached on August 22, and here Fremont was placed 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 271 

under arrest and ordered to report to the Adjutant 
General at Washington. 

About a month later Stockton himself followed 
across the plains, accompanied by Gillespie and an 
escort. Fremont arrived in Washington about the 
middle of September and an order convening a court- 
martial was issued September 27. After a hotly 
contested trial, in which affairs in California gen- 
erally were well illuminated, Fremont was found 
guilty on all the twenty-three specifications of the 
charges made against him, and he was sentenced to 
dismissal from the army. President Polk accepted 
the verdict but remitted the sentence. Fremont de- 
clined to resume service, but was permitted to resign. 
In 1849 he again reached California with a private 
exploring party. 

The removal of Kearney, Stockton and Fremont 
from California left affairs in charge of Colonel 
Richard B. Mason. The treaty of Guadalupe Hidal- 
go on February 2, 1848, had ended the war with 
Slexico and resulted in California becoming a Prov- 
ince of the United States, without a government save 
such as might be arbitrarily given it by the President 
of the United States. News of the close of the war 
did not reach California until late in the summer, and 
in the meantime gold had been discovered at Sutter's 
Mill, Coloma, and the news had gone forth to the 
world. 

At the beginning of hostilities with Mexico, the 
American population in California was small, but 
Americans were now coming literally by thousands. 
The population of California at the close of 1848 was 
a heterogeneous one, with a preponderance of senti- 
ment in favor of the adoption of laws common to the 
United States. Under Mexican rule there had been 
little more than a color of government, and to enforce 
old laws under the old system imtil recognition could 



272 CALIFORNIA 

be secured from Congress was a difficult task. And 
yet there was great need for good government, for, 
with the great surging masses of humanity were com- 
ing many lawless characters. The President had re- 
peatedly urged on Congress the necessity of action, 
without avail. The problem of slavery was begin- 
ning to loom large on the horizon and as California 
was not likely to become a slave state, those members 
who were seeking to preserve the balance between 
slave-holding and non-slave-holding states were un- 
willing to give statehood at once to the new territory. 

In April, 1848, Governor Mason was succeeded by 
General Bennet Riley. Riley, like his predecessor, 
was a broad-gaged, efficient official, who realized 
the necessity of something being done to bring order 
out of chaos. The feeling of unrest and dissatisfac- 
tion which had been growing among the people for a 
government finally crystallized into a convention 
which was held in Colton Hall at Monterey, Septem- 
ber 3, 1849. The history of the United States fur- 
nishes no parallel to this proceeding. Here was 
gathered a body of men representing all portions of 
the state for the purpose of forming a state out of an 
unorganized Territory, wholly on their own initia- 
tive. Dr. Robert Semple, who had taken such an 
active part in the Bear Flag war, was chosen chair- 
man. This body of men gathered to create a com- 
monwealth without color of authority must have 
been an interesting sight. Here were lawyers, doc- 
tors, merchants, bankers and printers and farmers, 
yet nearly all engaged in mining. It was a collec- 
tion of individuals who, by the very nature of their 
lives, were endowed with initiative, with self-reliance, 
with courage and intelligence. 

There seems to have been little thought of organ- 
izing a Territory. The framing of a constitution pro- 
ceeded rapidly and the completed document was 



THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 273 

signed on October 13, 1849. Its most important pro- 
vision was doubtless one which declared against 
slavery in the new state. The boundary of the state 
as it exists today was fixed and the convention 
throughout was marked by harmony. As soon as 
possible after the close of the convention, copies of 
the constitution were distributed through the state. 
November 13 had been fixed as election day and a 
spirited campaign was waged. The rainy season had 
begun and only a light vote was cast, but it was suffi- 
cient to ratify the constitution. Peter H. Burnett 
was elected Governor and John McDougall, Lieuten- 
ant-Governor. Edward Gilbert and Geo. W. Wright 
were elected to Congress. On December 15 the newly 
elected Legislature convened at San Jose, which be- 
came the new capital of the state. 

The first important action of the new Legislature 
was the election of United States Senators, John C. 
Fremont and William M. Gwin being selected. The 
newly-elected senators and congressmen left at once 
for Washington to exercise their influence in secur- 
ing admission of California to statehood. It is need- 
less to say that they were not welcomed, especially 
by those members of Congress from the south. After 
four years of delay, during which time California's 
claims had repeatedly been the subject of bitter dis- 
cussion, statehood was finally granted on September 
9, 1850. Fremont drew the short senatorial term, 
which gave him only a few weeks in which to repre- 
sent the state whose fortunes had been so closely 
linked with his own. 

San Jose remained the capital of the state for two 
years, after which the seat of government was re- 
moved to Vallejo, where it remained until 1853. For 
one year the capital was at Benecia, but in 1854 the 
seat of the state government was removed to the city 



274 CALIFORNIA 

of Sacramento, where it has remained until the pres- 
ent time. 

In 1849 Major Robert Selden Garnett of the U. S. 
Army designed the great seal of the State of Cali- 
fornia. An explanation of the design is officially 
entered in the records of the State of California as 
foUows: "Around the bend of the ring are repre- 
sented thirty-one stars, being the number of states 
of which the Union will consist upon the admission 
of California. The foreground figure represents the 
Goddess Minerva, having sprung full-grown from the 
brain of Jupiter. She is introduced as a type of the 
political birth of the State of California, without hav- 
ing gone through the probation of a Territory. At 
her feet crouches a grizzly bear feeding upon the 
clusters from a grape-vine, emblematic of the pecu- 
liar characteristics of the country. A miner is en- 
gaged with his rocker and bowl at his side, illustrating 
the golden wealth of the Sacramento, upon whose 
waters are seen shipping, typical of commercial 
greatness; and the snow-clad peaks of the Sierra 
Nevada make up the background, while above is the 
Greek motto 'Eureka' (I have found it), applying 
either to the principle involved in the admission of 
the state, or the success of the miner at work." 

Thus was completed the American conquest of 
California three hundred and eight years after the 
discovery of its golden shores by the immortal Por- 
tuguese mariner, Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo, who 
sailed in his Spanish galleon from Old Mexico in 
1542, fifty years after the discovery of the New World 
by Christopher Columbus. 




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THE FIVE MIRACLES 

In the world's history of commercial and indus- 
trial progress California lays claim to five distinct 
miracles of achievement. These are: 

I. The building of the chain of twenty-one Fran- 
ciscan Missions in an uncivilized land, resulting in 
the regeneration of the Indians of California from 
heathen barbarism to Christianity and the arts of 
peace. 

II. The building of the Central Pacific railroad 
across the Sierra Nevada mountains. 

III. The reclamation of the deserts by irrigation. 

IV. The rebuilding of the city of San Francisco 
in three years after its destruction by earthquake 
and fire in 1906. 

V. The Owens River aqueduct. 

Before and since these achievements, and in be- 
tween them, there are many other milestones on the 
road of human progress which California may well 
point to with pride, but the "five miracles" above 
named stand out as climaxes in the pageant. 

From Junipero Serra's first little, uncertain irri- 
gation ditch at San Diego, from the ox-teams of the 
pioneer traders, the caravels of the Spanish ex- 
plorers and mariners and the wind- jamming brigs 
of New England that wandered around Cape Horn 
to California in quest of hides and taUow, it is, in- 
deed, a far cry forward to the mighty railways and 
the splendid deep-sea steamship Lines of today which 



276 CALIFORNIA 

place California and her thronging harbors in quick 
and constant touch with all the world. 

The fact that more than three hundred years of 
time elapsed after the voyage of discovery by Juan 
Rodriguez Cabrillo before California assumed the 
position in the world's commerce to which her nat- 
ural wealth and advantages entitled her, will not be 
a cause for wonder when the conditions that sur- 
rounded her are understood. For the purpose of 
necessary enlightenment it might be well to briefly 
review those conditions. 

Considering California in its present entity, the 
date of its discovery was the year 1542, only fifty 
years after the discovery of America by Christopher 
Columbus. Why, then, was advancement and com- 
mercial progress so much greater on the Atlantic 
Coast than it has been on the Pacific Coast of the 
present boundaries of the United States? 

The time-worn boast that it was due to the superior 
energy, virility and intelligence of the Anglo-Saxon 
will hardly suffice. Following the discovery of the 
New World by Coliunbus, the Spanish and the 
Portuguese practically dominated the whole earth 
between them. It was the Latin race that was then 
the incarnation of vigor, both on sea and land. 

The true answer is that had California faced 
Europe and not Cathay the Atlantic seaboard of the 
United States would still be to some extent an un- 
populated wilderness. The Orient has been asleep 
for a much longer period of time than three centur- 
ies, while Europe, where Latin, Teuton, Saxon and 
Celt are combined, has been very much awake. 

This and this alone is the reason that California 
trailed along, isolated and unprogressive, three hun- 
dred years behind the Atlantic seaboard. The three 
centuries that are to come will teU an entirely dif- 



THE FIVE MIRACLES 277 

f erent story. That the checkerboard of Fate wiU be 
exactly reversed it is scarcely worth while to argue. 

From the commanding position commercially 
which she has now attained and which she is destined 
with absolute certainty to incalculably increase, Cali- 
fornia stands forth a veritable Empire of the Sun. 
It is as a land of sunshine that she is dreamed of 
throughout the universe. And that she is called a 
golden land means not only that her hills and valleys 
have been and are still unrivalled in golden wealth, 
but also that she is a land of golden weather. In the 
poetry of her Pantheism, the sun god is California's 
titular deity. 

In the fertility of her soil California equals the 
VaUey of the Nile or any other distinct section of 
the earth, even taking into consideration the vastly 
smaller areas of those sections. In the extent, 
variety and richness of her mineral wealth she has 
no rival. Climatically she stands alone in a class by 
herself, comparison in this respect being wholly 
invidious and a wastefulness of time. 

If California were to be lifted from its setting 
between the mountains and the sea and placed over 
on the Atlantic Coast it would cover the territory 
reaching from Cape Cod to Charleston in South 
Carolina. The state is over seven hundred miles 
long and has a coast line of approximately one thou- 
sand miles. It extends over an area larger than that 
of New England, New York and Pennsylvania com- 
bined. The United Kingdoms of Great Britain and 
Ireland are not nearly as large in area as California. 

Great variations in climate might be expected in a 
stretch of country extending over nine degrees of 
latitude, and it is true that almost any sort of climate 
may be found in California, in spots, from vaUeys of 
endless warmth to mountain peaks of eternal ice and 
snow. But it is to be remembered that there is much 



278 CALIFORNIA 

the same climate everywhere in the state during the 
major portion of the year. There are seasons when 
in the central and southern valleys the heat is in- 
tense, running up to as high as 120 degrees. On the 
other hand, in the extreme northern parts of the state 
there is occasionally a stretch of good sleighing in 
winter. But, for six hundred miles in between the 
northern counties and those of the south the climate 
may be said to be the same, which is to say that there 
is the same kind of weather Christmas Day as the 
Fourth of July — blue skies and balmy air, the days 
not too warm and the nights delightfully cool. 

Civilization had its beginning in California with 
the arrival of Fray Junipero Serra and the Fran- 
ciscans at San Diego in 1769. Its commercial awak- 
ening, however, did not really take place until 
the gold discoveries of 1848. There was a small com- 
merce, to be sure, prior to 1848, but it was trivial. 
Even following 1848, until several years after the 
close of the Civil War, California gave no fitting 
prophecy of her present standing in the world's trade, 
much less of her glittering future, the very thought 
of which thrills the imagination. 

At the height of his success a man likes to look 
backward over the long road up which he has strug- 
gled. It is equally as fascinating to review the strug- 
gles of a commonwealth that has risen from obscur- 
ity and the dust and ruin of time to entity and power. 
Arid no province, state or principality has had a more 
romantic rise to greatness than California has had. 

Spaniards controlled the trade of the Philippines 
until about 1815, and their richly freighted galleons 
from those islands, which were so often the prey of 
Sir Francis Drake and other British privateersmen, 
came always almost in sight of the shores of Califor- 
nia. This was owing to the fact that as early as 1565 
Andres de Urdenata had discovered the northwest 



THE FIVE MIRACLES 279 

trade winds by means of which ships are wafted 
straight from Asia to the Golden Gate. 

Here, then, were the Spaniards having knowledge 
that California existed; and the question has been 
asked why they did not do something with it ? Blithe 
writers of books innumerable have invariably pointed 
out that nothing in the way of commerce worthy of 
the name was set in motion in California until "the 
Gringos came." And that is true, only that the 
"Gringos" were also a long time in California before 
they were distinguished in commerce. 
The reason the Spaniards paid no attention to 
California is that they were too busy in Mexico, South 
America and the Western Islands, where the picking 
was extremely good. They knew little or nothing 
about California except that it was a pleasant coun- 
try. That it was rich in gold, silver and other 
precious metals they did not know. Had they known 
what James W. Marshall came to know one morning 
at Coloma in Sutter's millrace, it may be regarded as 
an absolute certainty that Spaniards would have been 
as thick in California as the leaves in Vallambrosa. 

From 1769 until, say, 1840, the Padres and their 
Indian neophytes were really the only people who 
did anything like work. The trade of California 
during all those years was its trade with itself. For 
a long time a cargo of hides and tallow was sent 
annually to Callao, in Spain, and occasionally a New 
England ship came to the ports to trade. In 1822 
an English firm doing business in Peru established a 
branch post at Monterey, but its transactions were 
not large. In 1832 the Missions — probably seeing 
that their end was near — made a spurt and sold up- 
wards of 100,000 hides to trading ships. In 1841 the 
total export trade did not exceed $150,000. For a 
few years the trade in the skins of sea otters was 
quite important, but by 1840 the otters had been ex- 



280 CALIFORNIA 

terminated. About this time the Russians did a Lit- 
tle trading in California, as did also the Hudson Bay 
Company, but altogether there was very little of it. 

With Marshall's discovery of gold in 1848, Cali- 
fornia awoke. It is true that she f eU into the habit 
of taking a siesta now and then, long after her awak- 
ening, but, on the whole, she forged ahead. 

It is estimated that the white population was not 
more than 12,000 in 1848, the vast majority of whom 
were of the Spanish race. A population of this size 
could not be expected, of course, to have built up an 
enormous commerce, yet writers appear to have 
thought that these 12,000 persons — including, doubt- 
less, a large number of women and children — should 
have covered the seas with a merchant marine. As 
a matter of fact the writers speak slightingly of the 
inhabitants of California of those times because of 
the lack of the seagoing trade. 

The harbor of San Francisco must have had the 
surprise of its existence when the ships began to sail 
in from every quarter of the globe on the heels of the 
news of the gold discovery. The last of February, 
1849, witnessed the arrival of the steamship ''Cali- 
fornia" from New York with the first party of gold- 
seekers from the Atlantic States. A month later the 
"Oregon" arrived. In June there were two hun- 
dred square-rigged vessels lying in San Francisco 
Bay. At the same time caravans were making their 
devious and dangerous way across the overland trail. 

With so sudden and so large an increase in popu- 
lation, California began to acquire a commerce. 

Beginning with a gold production of $10,000,000 
in 1848, the output of the placer diggings steadily 
rose, year by year, reaching the climax in 1853 when 
the production amounted to $65,000,000. For several 
years thereafter it continued in excess of $50,000,000 
a year and did not fall below $30,000,000 annually 



THE FIVE MIRACLES 281 

until 1864. During the twenty years following Mar- 
shall's discovery, California contributed nearly $1,- 
000,000,000 in gold to the wealth of the world. 

Exclusive of the mineral production, the state ap- 
pears to have been able to build up a handsome 
export merchandise trade during the twenty years 
following 1848. In 1851, for instance, these exports 
amounted to $1,000,000. The figures steadily in- 
creased from one year to another. In 1861, with the 
breaking out of the Civil War, with which, by the 
way, California was not largely disturbed, the ex- 
ports of merchandise had advanced to nearly $10,- 
000,000. In 1867 the figures had reached nearly 
$23,000,000. These figures are taken from the sta- 
tistics of the Port of San Francisco, which was the 
most important port and, indeed, the only port of 
importance on the California coast in those days. 

It took California a long time to get over the idea 
that nothing was worth while except the digging of 
gold. A f uU realization of this mistaken belief seems 
to have come about in the year 1868 when the wheat 
crop of the state equaled in value the output of gold. 
Men then began to turn their thoughts to the wealth 
of a soil which was to prove vastly more profitable 
than the placer mines had ever been. 

The great handicap that California suffered in her 
commercial ambitions at the time of her real awak- 
ening to the possibilities of agriculture, horticulture 
and husbandry in all its phases, was the lack of trans- 
portation facilities. There was no overland railway 
and the journeys by sea to the great markets of ''the 
States" and the world were extremely hazardous. 

In 1868 there were about three hundred miles of 
railway in California. There were little roads lead- 
ing here and there in the country adjacent to the Bay 
of San Francisco. The oldest road in the state ran 
a distance of twenty-one miles from Sacramento to 



282 CALIFORNIA 

Folsom. There was a road between San Francisco 
and San Jose. Another operated between Marys- 
viUe and OroviUe and there were several other small 
lines. 

The famous Central Pacific road, with which the 
names of Leland Stanford, C. P. Huntington, the 
Crockers, Mark Hopkins and others are forever 
associated, was operating over a distance of one hun- 
dred and five miles out of Sacramento in 1868. It 
had already surmounted the supposedly insurmount- 
able Sierra Nevada, swinging across altitudes of more 
than 7000 feet, under enormous snowsheds and cut- 
ting its way through fifteen tunnels in moimtains of 
solid granite. 

The subsidies granted to the Central Pacific com- 
pany by the United States Government were im- 
mense, yet not too tempting when the obstacles that 
had to be overcome are taken into consideration. 
The Government agreed to aid the company with 
loans for each mile of track laid and completed. In 
addition to this, concessions of every alternate section 
of public lands lying on each side of the road were 
granted. The city of San Francisco and the States 
of California and Nevada also rendered financial 
assistance to the project. 

The student of history who delves into the story of 
the construction of the Central Pacific railroad in its 
mere statistical features only, does not delve deep 
enough. In the shadows of the years, when Time 
has turned the throbbing brain and the fiery heart of 
dreamer and doer into dust, we are not apt to view 
a great accomplishment with anything more than 
analytical coldness. We see the mathematical figures 
and not the heroic figures of those who dreamed and 
those who wrought — the achievements of men who 
were as potent as the gods. 

California's first miracle was wrought by Junipero 



THE FIVE MIRACLES 283 

Serra at San Diego in 1769. Her second miracle 
was wrought exactly a century later when the golden 
spike was driven in a railway tie of California laurel 
on the wild and desolate deserts of Nevada, linking 
the Golden Gate with bands of iron to the Harbor 
of New York. Between the brown Franciscan mira- 
cle-worker of San Diego and the Yankee miracle- 
workers of Sacramento stretched the dusty highway 
of exactly one hundred years. 

For many years the dream of a transcontinental 
railroad had been a thing to keep warm the hearts 
that dwelt within the tents of the faithful amid the 
golden hills. Chief among these dreamers was a 
young engineer named Judah. The road was this 
man's vision. It was the dream that he carried with 
him everywhere, day and night, in the sun-swept val- 
leys and upon the starry trails. "Wherever Theodore 
Judah could find a willing ear to listen he wrought 
upon that wondering soul the wonder of his dream. 

With compass and caliper he had drawn upon his 
maps the winding trail of the iron horse across val- 
leys and plain, the snow-crowned Sierra and the mys- 
tic deserts that he knew so well. With his drawings 
under his arm he went, in 1860, to Washington, there 
to storm the citadels of power with his project. And 
he was earnestly listened to. But the dark clouds of 
war hovered over the nation then. The lightnings 
of death and its thunders were flashing and rumbling 
threateningly in the skies. Judah was told that he 
must await another and a happier time for the frui- 
tion of his hopes. 

Yet he came back to California undismayed, still 
with his dream, still wandering the trails of sun and 
stars in quest of neophjiies. And at last he found 
them. And it was in the most prosaic if not exactly 
humble surroundings. 



284 CALIFORNIA 

In the city of Sacramento in 1861 there were sev- 
eral enterprising merchants. All of them were thriv- 
ing in trade, but none of them had risen to great 
influence in the financial life of the West. There 
was Leland Stanford who had been a lawyer but who 
had abandoned Kent and Blackstone to engage in 
the perhaps less precarious occupation of a grocer. 
CoUis P. Huntington and Mark Hopkins were en- 
gaged in the hardware business. Charles Crocker 
kept a dry goods store. 

They were all clear-headed men, strong in charac- 
ter. After much discussion they held a meeting in 
June, 1861, and organized the Central Pacific Rail- 
road Company, facing boldly with their own resources 
a problem that was as big as any that had yet been 
faced by the human race. That they dreamed of 
large financial gains as a result of their boldness, it 
may as well be admitted, but that these men were 
equally impelled by high and patriotic motives it 
were a meanness to deny. They became very rich in 
the end, and Stanford rose to political greatness as 
Governor of California and as a Senator in Con- 
gress. He left his riches practically to the people 
when he died. The noble University that he erected 
and endowed in memory of his son, Leland Stanford, 
Jr., is his lasting monument for all time. 

The burden that this little band of empire-builders 
assiuned in undertaking the construction of the Cen- 
tral Pacific Railroad, with all the aid that it later 
received from the Government, was almost unpar- 
alleled. No engineering feat had ever before been 
attempted that was fraught with such tremendous 
difficulties. When Theodore Judah returned from 
Washington a second time victory perched on his 
banners, and he came also with a task for that coterie 
of Sacramento merchants that would have discour- 
aged any but the bravest men. 



THE FIVE MIRACLES 285 

For it was Judah who had succeeded at last in con- 
vincing Washington that the transcontinental rail- 
way should be built. The outbreak of the Civil War 
had served as a good argument in his behalf, after all. 
The Federal Government doubtless saw that unless 
the road were constructed the Republic was just that 
much more vulnerable to dismemberment. In July, 
1862, Abraham Lincoln signed the bill which had 
passed both houses of Congress and which started 
the Union Pacific on its way to meet the Central 
Pacific and thus create a transcontinental railway. 

Judah died without seeing his vision come true. 
His theoretical surveys, however, were practically 
followed by the Government engineers. The work 
was started and the troubles of the Sacramento 
dreamers began. The question of more ready money 
than had been provided was a constant nightmare. 
Stanford bombarded the coffers of the West and 
Huntington pleaded in the East. Crocker sweated 
and toiled on the mountains and the deserts, driving 
the road ahead. 

In the building of the road Charles Crocker dis- 
tinguished himself. To supply the lack of laborers 
he imported Chinese who proved industrious and 
peaceable workers. He organized them into com- 
panies and they were proudly referred to as "Crock- 
er's battalions." 

In an address before a committee of the Senate of 
the United States, in 1888, Creed Haymond described 
the difficulties which attended the construction of the 
Central Pacific across the Sierra. Haymond was 
attorney for the road, but every statement he made 
was borne out by facts and his great speech must for- 
ever remain as a classic in the literature of California. 
From this magnificent oration, which consumed three 
days' time in its delivery, the following vivid word 
pictures are extracted : 



286 CALIFORNIA 

''From Emigrant Gap to Truckee the difficulties 
encountered can never be described so as to be appre- 
ciated by one not conversant with that range of moun- 
tains or who has not lived among them during the 
months of almost constant storm. The snow usually 
begins to fall on the Sierra in the month of Novem- 
ber or December, and sometimes continues, with but 
slight intermission, until April or May. 

"On the western slope the annual snowfall will 
vary from thirty to sixty feet in depth, and snow has 
remained on the summit to the depth of four feet as 
late as July. Rain at intervals falls on these vast 
bodies of snow, and when they are reduced by the in- 
fluence of the rays of the sun and the saturation of 
rain to the depth of ten or fifteen feet the mass ceases 
to be snow and becomes a body of ice which cannot 
be removed except with pick and powder. 

"The three winters during which our people, with 
from ten to twelve thousand men, were working on 
these mountains were among the severest known in 
the history of the state. As the snow began to faU 
it required as many men to clear the ground as it did 
to do the work of excavation. As the storms pro- 
gressed it became impossible to clear off the snow, 
and the work was done under it. Long tunnels were 
run through the snow to get at the rock to be exca- 
vated and at the rock tunnels to be bored. Shafts 
were sunk in the snow ; domes excavated under them, 
and in these domes the masonry necessary to be used 
in construction was laid, the stones being lowered 
through the snow shafts. 

"There was constant danger from the mountain 
avalanches; men were frequently swept away and 
their remains not found until the snow melted in the 
summer. For miles and miles great masses of snow, 
drifted and compact, rested upon the cliffs near the 
summits of the mountains, endangering all below 



THE FIVE MIRACLES 287 

them, and these masses had, for protection, to be re- 
moved before the work could be even carried on with 
comparative safety. 

"While these storms were raging in the mountains 
rain deluged the foothills and the valleys, rendering 
them impassable even for teams, and many of the 
supplies to points which could not be reached by rail 
were borne upon the backs of mules. For days at a 
time so terrific would be these storms that not an 
hour's work could be done; yet the men who were 
risking their lives could only be retained by full pay- 
ment, whether working or idle. 

"While this work was going on in the mountains 
a force was pushed forty miles ahead to the canon 
of the Truckee, and twenty miles of rails with their 
fastenings, and locomotives and cars sufficient for 
carrying on the work in that canon, were hauled 
through the snow and over the simamit to that place. 
The expense of such transportation could only be 
appreciated by those who had lived in the Sierra dur- 
ing the winter months, and could only be justified 
by the necessity of the work and the great interest 
which the nation had therein. 

"It was also deemed important to do work in the 
lower mountains crossed by the railroad in Utah, so 
that when the track reached those points there should 
be no delay. Men and material were transported by 
wagons over deserts, sometimes forty miles without 
water, at immense cost. Provisions to sustain them 
and forage for teams were expensive beyond any- 
thing ever known in the Atlantic States. Barley 
and oats ranged from $200 to $300 per ton; hay, 
$120 per ton, and all other supplies in Utah in the 
same ratio. 

"The work in the Sierra was done before the days 
of high explosives or the Burleigh drill. Five hun- 
dred kegs of powder was the daily average, and its 



288 CALIFORNIA 

price was beyond anj^thing ever known in the country 
before. There were no means in California for man- 
ufacturing railroad material. Only a few years had 
elapsed since there had been any considerable emi- 
gration to the state. Labor was scarce, and only 
obtainable at great cost. Miners, accustomed to work 
or not in the placer mines, as it suited them, would 
not undergo the discipline of railroad work. They 
were indifferent and independent and their labor 
high-priced. 

'*At the first mining excitement many of them 
would abandon the work. As an illustration, 1100 
men were transported at one time to work on the 
eastern sections of the road, and out of 1100 only 
100 remained, the balance going to the mines newly 
opened at Austin, in Nevada. 

**Iron rails, laid in the track, 100 tons per mile 
(including switches, sidetracks and material), cost 
over $140 a ton. For two locomotive engines there 
was paid in cost and freight $70,000. The first ten 
engines purchased in a lot by the Central Pacific 
road cost $191,000 and the second ten upwards of 
$215,000. Freight by Cape Horn to San Francisco 
was over $2000 on the first locomotive. Cars were 
manufactured in the East, taken to pieces, brought 
around Cape Horn or across the Isthmus, landed at 
San Francisco, carried by boat to Sacramento and 
there put together. Thousands of tons of rails were 
transported by steamship from New York to Aspin- 
wall, thence across the Isthmus to Panama, and flien 
shipped again to San Francisco at great expense. 

"An average of 11,000 men were engaged for three 
years in this mighty work upon the mountains — a 
force far greater than General Taylor led across the 
Rio Grande to Monterey and to Buena Vista ; a force 
nearly in numbers to that with which General Scott 
swept from Vera Cruz to the City of Mexico. More 



THE FIVE MIEACLES 289 

work was done and more money actually expended in 
the construction of 150 miles of the Central Pacific 
road across the Sierra Nevada Mountains than would 
have been necessary to build the road from the east- 
ern base of those mountains to the city of Chicago. 

''When the mountains were passed the desert was 
encountered, and there was neither fuel nor timber. 
Water was scarce, and, except upon the Truckee and 
Humboldt rivers, had to be hauled by teams for steam 
and for the use of the grading forces. Thousands of 
dollars without result were expended in well-boring ; 
tunnels were run into the mountains east of Wads- 
worth, small springs developed, and the water thus 
found was carefully husbanded and conveyed, in some 
cases more than eight miles, in pipes to the line of 
the road. 

"There was not a tree for five hundred miles of 
the route that would make a board, and no satisfac- 
tory quality of building stone. With the exception of 
a few acres of stimted pine and juniper trees, all fuel 
was hauled over the Sierra. A maximum haul for 
ties was six hundred miles, and for rails and other 
materials and supplies the haul was the entire length 
of the Central Pacific road. 

"It has been said that the promoters of the Cen- 
tral Pacific road were wealthy when the road was 
completed from Sacramento to the connection near 
Ogden. If this was true who would complain? If 
they had failed to complete the road they would, it 
is true, have been losers, but the Government would 
have lost more. If the pioneer line had failed, the 
vast domain between the Missouri and the Sierra 
would in all probability have been still in the posses- 
sion of the savage. [1888.] None of the thousands 
of miles of road which runs through that territory 
would now be in existence. Their success meant the 
Government's success, and none could justly com- 



290 CALIFORNIA 

plain if the men who braved all and risked aU were 
sharers in the results which followed. 

''But what is the truth in this respect? When the 
junction was made and the road finally completed, 
these men had expended all their means — all the aids 
granted — and were more than three millions of dol- 
lars in debt for which they were personally liable." 

All this and the rest that Creed Haymond said 
before the Senate committee may be regarded as the 
special pleading of an eloquent lawyer on behalf of 
his clients. Yet what he said was the truth. 

It was indeed a fateful day, that tenth of May, 
1869, when the two roads came together and the great- 
est achievement of the nineteenth century, or of any 
century that preceded it, was consummated. At that 
hour the attention of the civilized world was concen- 
trated on the sagebrush plains of Nevada where Cali- 
fornia was joined by rail with the Atlantic seaboard. 

Beside the himdreds of laborers, mechanics, engi- 
neers and builders present, a number of distinguished 
men was in attendance. The ceremonies were unique 
and such as to appeal to the most fervid powers of 
the imagination. On the last day Charles Crocker 
made the world's record in railroad construction 
when the forces under his command laid ten miles 
and one hundred and eighty-five feet of track. 

The last spike to be driven was made of California 
gold, and the railway tie in which the silver sledge- 
hammer was to drive it was of the wood of the Cali- 
fornia laurel. The Territory of Arizona sent an 
offering of a spike made of gold, silver and iron. A 
silver spike was presented by Nevada. 

As the epoch-making moment arrived, Leland Stan- 
ford and Vice-President Durant of the Union Pacific 
each struck the golden spike with blows from the sil- 
ver hammer. Telegraph wires attached to the spike 



THE FIVE MIRACLES 291 

repeated the blows east and west. The electric wave 
rang the bells in the city haU at San Francisco and 
fired a cannon at Fort Point. At that instant the 
whole city went mad with joy. And in the East the 
excitement was no less. Celebrations were held in 
Buffalo, Boston and other cities, while away on the 
wild plains of the West the engines were advancing 
and backing in an exchange of eloquent courtesies. 
Francis Bret Harte glorified the event in the follow- 
ing verses : 

WHAT THE ENGINES SAID 

What was it the Engines said, 
Pilots touching, — head to head 
Facing on the single track, 
Half a world behind each back? 
This is what the Engines said, 
Unreported and unread. 

With a prefatory screech, 
In a florid Western speech. 
Said the Engine from the WEST : 
"I am from Sierra's crest; 
And if altitude's a test, 
Why, I reckon, it's confessed 
That I've done my level best." 

Said the Engine from the EAST : 
"They who work best talk the least. 
S'pose you whistle down your brakes; 
What you've done is no great shakes, — 
Pretty fair, — but let our meeting 
Be a different kind of greeting. 
Let these folks with champagne stuffing, 
Not their Engines, do the puffing. 



292 CALIFOENIA 

"Listen! Where Atlantic beats 
Shores of snow and summer heats; 
Where the Indian autumn skies 
Paint the woods with wampum dyes,- 
I have chased the flying sun, 
Seeing all he looked upon, 
Blessing all that he has blessed, 
Nursing in my iron breast 
All his vivifying heat, 
All his clouds about my crest; 
And before my flying feet 
Every shadow must retreat." 

Said the Western Engme, 'Thew!" 
And a long, low whistle blew. 
"Come, now, really that's the oddest 
Talk for one so very modest. 
You brag of your East! You do? 
Why, I bring the East to you! 
All the Orient, all Cathay, 
Find through me the shortest way; 
And the sun you follow here 
Rises in my hemisphere. 
Really, — if one must be rude, — 
Length, my friend, ain't longitude." 

Said the Union: "Don't reflect, or 
I'll run over some Director." 
Said the Central : " I 'm Pacific ; 
But, when riled, I'm quite terrific. 
Yet today we shall not quarrel. 
Just to show these folks this moral, 
How two Engines — in their vision — 
Once have met without collision." 



THE FIVE MIRACLES 293 

That is what the Engines said, 
Unreported and unread; 
Spoken slightly through the nose, 
With a whistle at the close. 

The "Big Four" — as Stanford, Huntington, 
Crocker and Hopkins came to be popularly known 
— reaped fully the rewards of their daring enter- 
prise. They soon acquired the Western Pacific, 
which connected San Francisco and San Jose. They 
went steadily onward, building and expanding. They 
secured a terminus on the Oakland side of the Bay. 
Under the name of the ''Southern Pacific Railroad," 
the great system which the four merchants of Sacra- 
mento began on no other foundation than their own 
private means and the dream of Theodore D. Judah, 
has been flung north and south, to the forests of the 
northwest, the Gulf of Mexico, and Mexico's west 
coast, far and near, till it covers the West like an 
octopus with countless tentacles. 

The ''Big Four" came to hold tremendous power 
in their hands. They quarreled with the public and 
even quarreled among themselves. Huntington out- 
lasted them all, standing at last as the greatest rail- 
road man of his time. Now the dust covers them, 
each and all. They died richer than their own wild- 
est dreams. But had they died in rags their fame 
were none the less secure. They were the boldest 
dreamers of their age; and when their dreams were 
done the iron horse neighed in the desert's desolation 
and whinnied to his mates from cloud-piercing moun- 
tain peaks amid the wastes of immemorial snows. 

Several other railroads have followed since. In 
1880 the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, 
with the romance of the old "Santa Fe Trail" behind 
it, succeeded in making an entrance into California 
and now operates its lines nearly the entire length 



294 CALIFORNIA 

of the state with terminals at both San Diego and 
Oakland across the Bay from San Francisco. 

This road is popularly called the "Santa Fe," in 
the West at least, and the name is indeed appropriate, 
for the reason that to reach the ancient city of Santa 
Fe in New Mexico it was originally projected. 

Santa Fe was established as a Spanish settlement 
early in the sixteenth century, probably by stragglers 
from the army of Coronado. For many years the 
pueblo depended on the City of Mexico, fifteen hun- 
dred miles distant, for its touch with civilization. 
The scant trade which was carried on between the 
two places proved tremendously expensive. Then 
American trappers and wanderers found the settle- 
ment. In 1812, Kansas City (then known as West- 
port) , began to reach out for business, and a trading 
expedition was sent out from that point to Santa Fe. 
The caravan was promptly confiscated and the 
traders thrown into prison as "Yankee spies." 

This incident did not, of course, deter other traders 
from venturing across the plains to Santa Fe. Soon 
the trail was blazed completely and was dusty with 
the caravans of the Yankees. They had much to 
contend with, but the trade was profitable. Despite 
the fact that old Dick Wooten had preempted the 
Raton Pass where he exacted tolls from the traders, 
and in the face of marauding bands of Indians, the 
outfits from Kansas City made good money in their 
dealings with the Spaniards. In 1843 the annual 
trade of the Santa Fe Trail amounted to not less than 
$450,000, employing three hundred and fifty men and 
the use of two hundred and thirty wagons which were 
drawn by mules or oxen. Seventy days were required 
to make the trip outward with the loads, while the 
practically empty wagons were able to return inside 
of forty days. In later days a line of stage coaches, 



THE FIVE MIRACLES 295 

often protected by United States troops, made the 
trip with passengers in two weeks. 

In 1863 the railway was first projected from Kan- 
sas City and was pushed on across the old Santa Fe 
Trail. This line was the nucleus of the Atchison, 
Topeka and Santa Fe Railway which is today one of 
the most splendid systems of transportation in the 
world. The road was continued to Albuquerque and 
later gained entrance to California through an ar- 
rangement with the Southern Pacific by which the 
Santa Fe acquired the old Atlantic and Pacific road 
from Needles to Mojave. It then built from Bar- 
stow into Los Angeles and San Diego and later ac- 
quired a line through the San Joaquin Valley, paral- 
leling the Southern Pacific to Oakland. 

Among the later invasions of railways that have 
terminals at Oakland and San Francisco, the West- 
ern Pacific, or *' Gould Line," is especially im- 
portant. This road affords a valuable outlet for 
California to the northwest in addition to other facili- 
ties in the same direction. The Western Pacific also 
proves of inestimable value in developing the mar- 
velously rich agricultural and mineral sections of 
extreme northern California. 

The latest of the transcontinental railways to find 
a western terminus at Los Angeles was the San Pedro, 
Los Angeles & Salt Lake Railroad, better known by 
its trademark title, the ''Salt Lake Route." 

During twenty years there had been several at- 
tempts made to construct a direct line of railway 
between Los Angeles and Salt Lake City, Utah, fol- 
lowing closely the original pioneer pathway between 
these two cities which has passed into history as "The 
Mormon Trail." 

Until 1901 all of these attempts at the construction 
of this line, over practically an air line route to 
the Mormon capital, had been failures. At that time 



296 CALIFORNIA 

the project was taken up by former United States 
Senator W. A. Clark of Montana who, in conjunc- 
tion with several capitalist friends, planned and 
finally finished the line which reduced the distance 
between Pacific tidewater and Utah's metropolis by 
over one-third. Allied with Senator Clark was his 
brother, J. Ross Clark, who had for several years 
been a resident of Los Angeles and on whom fell 
the carrying out of the details of construction. 

By the purchase of what was then known as the 
Los Angeles Terminal Railway, excellent terminal 
properties were secured at Los Angeles as well as 
extensive and valuable properties at San Pedro which 
latter gave the new line particularly advantageous 
wharf and waterfront facilities at the port. 

On May 1, 1905, the Clark railroad was opened as 
a transcontinental line with through service and fast 
trains to Chicago connecting at Salt Lake City with 
the Harriman system. The new line sprang at once 
into popularity. 

One of the particular features of the new railroad 
was the scenic beauty of that section of the line which 
wound through the series of canons which form the 
Meadow Valley wash in southern Nevada. This 
route proved, for some time, a serious detriment, 
owing to the losses suffered at this point from flood 
waters. To meet these conditions without abandon- 
ing its scenic capital, it became necessary to raise 
the line high above the possible reach of floods. To 
accomplish this one hundred miles of the heaviest 
kind of construction were planned and carried out, 
which stand today as a bulwark of safety through 
that gorge in the Nevada hills where the Mormons 
first blazed a trail in making the original Anglo- 
Saxon emigration to California. The construction 
of this high line by the Clark road has formed one of 
the great engineering feats of western railroad his- 



THE FIVE MIEACLES 297 

tory and the cost of a hundred miles of line through 
these winding canons has run up into the millions. 

A branch of the Clark system connects the Salt 
Lake Route with the great mining zone of Nevada 
and is known as the Las Vegas and Tonopah Rail- 
road. This line has been constructed north from 
Las Vegas, Nevada, to Goldfield in the same state. 
Another branch connects the main line with the his- 
toric mining camp of Pioche, Nevada. 

California 's third miracle is the reclamation of the 
deserts by irrigation. Here the term "desert" is 
used in a very broad sense, even stretching the mean- 
ing to include more than arid lands, and taking in 
every portion of the state where agriculture and 
horticulture is or can be aided by irrigation. 

One hundred million acres of land is the total area 
of California. A great deal of this land is not irri- 
gable owing to its situation on mountains. But it is 
safe to say that at least twenty million acres are 
irrigable and that the water supply of the state from 
its rivers and by means of artesian wells is ample to 
meet this demand when it shall have fully arrived. 
At the time this book is written about five million 
acres are imder irrigation. In no other state of the 
Union is there an available supply of water for irri- 
gation for so great an area of fertile land. 

In the early history of California the province was 
composed of vast ranchos over which cattle and sheep 
roamed at will. Indeed it is only now that the state 
is entering upon its real destiny as a country of small 
farms occupied by a large population. Until re- 
cently it was not believed that water in great quanti- 
ties for irrigation purposes could be secured. Now 
it is known that over forty-five million acre feet of 
water are available from the streams of California 
alone, not to speak of the vast quantities that are to 
be had from subterranean sources. 



298 CALIFORNIA 

The $27,000,000 expended on irrigation in Califor- 
nia up to the year 1902 had come mostly from the 
promoters of private enterprises. The returns from 
these irrigated farms to the farmer are not millions, 
but hundreds of millions of dollars, the amount 
increasing every year as though by magic. The Im- 
perial Valley, which is an empire in itself, was aided 
by the Government to enable the settlers to secure 
water from the Colorado River. Never was a more 
sudden transformation from desert to blossom wit- 
nessed, as a result. Cities sprang up almost in a day. 
A vast expanse of green fields gladdens the eye of the 
traveler now where only a few years ago there was 
only the desolation of sand and scraggy greasewood. 
Thousands upon thousands of acres in the San Joa- 
quin and other valleys where crops of wheat were 
grown wholly on the gamble of uncertain rains are 
now lush with alfalfa fields, busy with dairy farming 
and marvelous with the finest fruit orchards on earth. 

If there be miracles this is surely one, that out of 
desolation there has sprung verdure and opulence at 
the touch of living waters. Here has the American 
Moses struck the rock and brought forth the springs 
of life. Men once said that God had made Califor- 
nia without a flaw except for its lack of water. But 
now it is seen that there is no such lack. 

It were idle to attempt to foretell the time when 
the products of California, resulting from water on 
the land, will cease to increase. Every day there is 
a new green field, a new orchard, a new vineyard, 
another flame of flower in a magic garden where there 
was no garden yesterday. Not only the valleys but 
the mesas and the very fastnesses of the mountains 
are made to bloom. 

Perhaps the most striking result of irrigation in 
California is the creation of the citrus industry. In 
the production of oranges, especially, California has 



THE FIVE MIRACLES 299 

not even a near competitor anywhere. More tlian 
thirty thousand carloads of oranges are shipped out 
of the state every year, and the limit has not been 
reached. What the production will be in years to 
come no man can say. 

The particular variety of orange which has made 
Southern California noted and which forms the bulk 
of the citrus product is known as the ''Washington 
Navel," which made its way into the United States 
from Brazil. Two trees were brought from the Gov- 
ernment experimental station at Washington. They 
thrived wonderfully on California soil. One of these 
trees, known as "the original orange tree," is still to 
be seen in the patio of the famous Glenwood Mission 
Inn at Riverside on which spot it was transplanted 
by Theodore Roosevelt, then President of the United 
States, on May 7, 1903. On that memorable occa- 
sion, the late John North of Riverside, President of 
the Pioneer Society, addressed President Roosevelt 
and the multitude assembled, as follows : 

"This little tree is of importance and historic value 
far beyond anything indicated by its size or appear- 
ance. It is the progenitor of that great industry 
which has done most to make Southern California 
famous. The two trees, of which this is one, were 
brought from Bahia, in Brazil, and sent to River- 
side by the Agricultural Department at Washington 
in the year 1874. From these two trees, by the proc- 
ess of budding into seedling stock, all of the navel 
oranges of California have sprung. The fruit of 
this tree is so perfect, its descendants so numerous, 
its posterity so great, its family so enormous, that we 
believe it merits your unqualified approval." 

California's fourth miracle is without a parallel 
anywhere in either ancient or modern times. On 
the morning of the nineteenth of April, 1906, San 
Francisco, with a population of half a million souls, 



300 CALIFORNIA 

was destroyed by earthquake and fire. For three 
days of horror the flames consumed the city and it 
lay at last a pathetic and blackened ruin beside the 
Golden Gate. 

Then the work of fifty years and longer, that was 
destroyed in three days, was done over again in three 
years — done better and at greater expense. It was 
an achievement that must stand forever as an in- 
spiration to the entire human race. 

The shock of the earthquake would, of itself, have 
done no great damage had not a break occurred in 
the mains which carried the city's water supply, thus 
rendering the fire department helpless when the con- 
flagration broke out. In the incredibly short space 
of fifty-two hours the flames had destroyed twenty- 
eight thousand buildings, licking five hundred and 
fourteen city blocks clean of structures of steel and 
stone, brick and wood. The loss was a billion dollars. 

The great heart of the world was stricken with 
infinite pity. Men in all lands and the wanderers 
upon every sea had loved San Francisco as few cities 
had ever been loved. Its olden haunts so dear to 
Bohemia, its streets glamorous with the romance of 
'49, its love of life and color and its tireless hospital- 
ity were recalled and mourned as things that now had 
passed away forever. That a generation, at least, 
must pass before the city could be rebuilt — if, indeed, 
it were ever to be rebuilt — was the settled conclusion 
of all thoughtful minds. But the world that knew so 
well the city that was, was yet to know of what god- 
like fiber the people of San Francisco, themselves, 
were made. 

' ' The first contract for a large building was signed, 
sealed and delivered six days after the disaster fell," 
writes Rufus Steele. "Scores of other buildings 
were being planned, but the contract referred to was 
the first to take on a notarial seal, so far as known. 



THE FIVE MIRACLES 301 

At that time the fire was still burning itself out in a 
hundred different places. It was impossible to get 
out of the city or back into it without a permit signed 
by the Governor and military commander. There 
were no building materials at hand ; indeed there was 
still no food supply except that in the hands of the 
soldiery, but the men who undertook that contract 
were of the sort who could scramble for bricks and 
biscuits at the same time. 

' ' The rebuilding dates back to those uncertain days 
of all manner of unfamiliar doings. The first thing 
that came out of chaos was the resolve to reconstruct, 
and action followed fast on resolution. It is a fact 
that on some lots in San Francisco the debris was 
not allowed to cool. Broken bricks were pitched 
from many a site while the bricks were still as warm 
as muffins. The property owner who was not im- 
pressed by the soldiery and set to cleaning the streets 
at the point of the bayonet, was likely to secure a 
shovel and advance upon his own premises as fast as 
the djong heat would permit." 

Awful as the blow proved to be, the destruction of 
the city brought out all that was wonderful and ex- 
ceptional in Californians who have in their veins the 
heritage of the men and women who came around 
the Horn and faced the trackless wilderness of plain 
and mountain and desert in the "Days of Forty- 
nine" — and before those days. More beautiful than 
ever, stronger and greater than ever, again the City 
of St. Francis looks out upon the Sunset Sea from 
thrice her seven hills — once more, 
' ' Serene, indifferent of Fate, 
She sits beside the Golden Gate," 

The fifth of the miracles, and in some respects the 
greatest, is the Owens River Aqueduct, two-thirds 
completed as this book is written and destined to be 



302 CALIFORNIA 

wholly completed before the ships will have sailed 
through the Panama Canal. 

The story of the Owens River Aqueduct is the story 
of a great city builded on a desert that one day awoke 
to the very serious fact that it must stop growing or 
find more water for its uses. The city did not desire 
to stop growing, but there was no more water any- 
where within sight that it could obtain. It had 
utilized to the utmost limit every drop of water 
in every stream and in every well to which it had a 
right or could ever have a right in all the land of 
Southern California. The city that faced this grave 
problem was the city of Los Angeles. 

The story of the Owens River Aqueduct is also the 
story of the unlimited confidence that the people of 
Los Angeles placed in one man and upon that man's 
word. The man is William MulhoUand, and he kept 
the faith. 

Los Angeles was founded as a Spanish pueblo in 
1781 by Don Felipe de Neve, Governor of the Cali- 
fornias. Throughout the Spanish era in California 
and the Mexican era which followed, the pueblo had 
not been an important place. Even under Ameri- 
can rule its growth was slow for many years. But 
at last it awoke. In the year 1905 it had attained 
to a population of close to 300,000 and was growing 
like magic. It was then that William Mulholland, 
who was the engineer and superintendent of the city's 
water works, saw that Los Angeles must have more 
water or bar her gates against a further influx of 
population. 

While Mulholland was worrying himself over the 
situation, there came to him a man named Fred 
Eaton, who had been connected with the water works 
of Los Angeles in former years and who had later 
served a term as Mayor of the city. For a period of 
thirteen years prior to 1905, however, Eaton had re- 



THE FIVE MIRACLES 303 

sided in the Owens River Valley in Inyo county, 
northward more than two hundred miles from Los 
Angeles. In that valley there is a river tumbling 
down from the eternal snows of the Sierra into an 
alkaline lake. The waters of the river are as pure 
as crystal and were being put to little or no use by 
anybody. Eaton told MulhoUand about this stream. 
Then and there these two men conceived the gigantic 
dream of diverting the waters of the Owens River to 
the uses of Los Angeles. 

Eaton led the engineer to the spot and MulhoUand 
became absolutely convinced of the feasibility of the 
idea. They kept their movements secret. Later, 
when he had checked up and felt certain of his 
ground, MulhoUand confided the secret to the Water 
Board of Los Angeles, a body composed of strong 
men appointed without regard to their political 
affiliations. The board supplied the engineer with 
f imds to make surveys and to buy up water rights 
in the Valley of the Owens River. So quietly and 
successfully was everything done that when specu- 
lators became taformed of the proposed project, the 
city was wholly in possession of all that was worth 
having. Then, one morning, the whole matter was 
announced in the columns of the Los Angeles Times, 
creating the greatest sensation in the city's history. 

To put the Aqueduct through was a question of 
twenty-three million dollars. A bond issue was 
promptly voted and MulhoUand was told to go ahead. 
This man, who was not a product of the schools, was 
given unquestioningly a project so immense to handle. 
Eaton was the dreamer in whose soul was born the 
vision of a city saved. MulhoUand was the doer. 

Born m Ireland, William MulhoUand went to sea 
when a lad and beat around the world before the mast. 
When stUl not more than twenty years old he reached 
Los Angeles and was employed as the **zanjero" of 



304 CALIFORNIA 

the pueblo — the man whose duty it was to look after 
the water ditches. He lived in a cabin alone for sev- 
eral years. He spent his nights in study. He taught 
himself what the schools teach other men. He rose 
to be superintendent of the Los Angeles water works. 
And when he had spent thirty years among these peo- 
ple they placed twenty-three million dollars practi- 
cally at his disposal to bring a river from the high 
Sierra down to their town. The faith of the people 
in him was without a flaw. The "zanjero" rose at 
one bound to take his place among the greatest engi- 
neers of the world. 

Los Angeles was able to supply its three hundred 
thousand inhabitants with water before the Owens 
River Aqueduct was decided upon. Now it obtains 
an additional supply of two hundred and sixty million 
gallons daily from an unpolluted source that has a 
drainage area of twenty-eight hundred square miles. 
For many years the city will be able to supply water 
for the irrigation of thousands of acres of land beside 
developing from the Aqueduct electrical power to 
the extent of one hundred and twenty thousand horse- 
power, peak load, for manufacturing purposes. 
What tMs means to a city that already has a great 
harbor and a "back country" rich in every way is a 
question that only the imagination may attempt to 
answer. 

The romance of today is the romance of the wild 
places made to blossom, of orange and lemon and 
peach and apple orchards, and vineyards crowding 
the valleys and the hillsides where once roamed the 
deer in the wild clover and barley. It is the romance 
of roaring cities that clash with traffic, of trade that 
sings at its looms, of ships that rock in the happy 
harbors. 

The tide of power, ever shifting through the count- 
less ages of the world, now to Tyre and now to Garth- 



THE FIVE MIRACLES 305 

age, again to Britain and again to Gaul, the steel 
leviathans of the oceans dimming the glory of the 
Phoenician with his first little ragged sail — this tide 
of power shifts now to the western shores of America. 
California faces the awakening Orient with its count- 
less peoples, and its undreamed of and undeveloped 
wealth. And, in the days to be, she shaU outrival the 
achievements of all the past as she sits in queenly 
sway upon her golden throne of greatness and con- 
tent. 

But, in considering the present and future great- 
ness of California, the imagination constantly re- 
verts to the first attempts that were made at civiliza- 
tion and commercial progress. One who knows and 
loves the story of California can never behold the 
great irrigation ditches which wake to living bloom 
the vast stretches of opulent plain and valley without 
seeing, as in a dream, the first uncertain waterway 
which Junipero Serra projected in the Mission Val- 
ley of San Diego. As one speeds now upon the shin- 
ing highways that link towns and cities together from 
end to end of the Golden State, memory stirs in the 
loving heart the dream of days when the Mission 
hospices, with their fiocks and herds on the hillsides, 
and the Indian neophytes chanting in the harvest 
fields, awaited the welcome traveler on the King's 
Highway. And thus Junipero Serra stands forth 
the first and greatest character of which California 
yet can boast — her first missionary, her first mer- 
chant, the first of her empire builders. 

That the Five Miracles will be increased by other 
miracles to which California shall also lay fuU claim 
as she speeds ever onward on the road of progress is 
not a subject that the historian of today may discuss, 
but it is something in which the faithful may believe. 
A land so rich in soil, so nearly perfect in climate, 
and which has practically an inexhaustible wealtli of 



306 CALIFORNIA 

minerals wiU not fall asleep. With her thousand 
miles of sea coast California is fitted as a keystone 
into the western shores of both the Americas. Before 
her lie Cathay, the Orient, Asia and Africa, the 
continents and the islands of the greatest of the 
oceans. Behind her are all other lands and all other 
seas. Her soul is the soul of beauty; her heart is 
boundless in its love. 

The mighty mountains o'er it, 
Below, the white seas swirled — 

Just California, stretching down 
The middle of the world. 



APPENDIX 



COUNTIES IN CALIFORNIA 

The following data concerning the names and the origin of 
the counties of California were prepared by Prentiss Maslin and 
published officially by direction of the State Legislature in ac- 
cordance with an Act approved February 12, 1903 : 

Alameda County — Created March 25, 1853. The Spanish 
word "Alameda" means "a public walk or promenade in the 
shade of trees." Literally, it comes from Alamo, the poplar 
or Cottonwood tree, and it is from the derived meaning of the 
word, "a public walk," that this county obtained its name. 

Alpine County — Created March 16, 1864. This county derived 
its name from the English word "Alpine," meaning, "of, per- 
taining to, or connected with, the Alps." Its geographical posi- 
tion, lying as it does on the crest of the Sierra Nevada Moun- 
tains, made it particularly an Alpine county, and hence its name. 

Amador County— Created May 11, 1854. The meaning of this 
word in Spanish is "lover of inanimate objects." This county 
most probably derived its name from either Sergeant Pedro 
Amador or from Jose Maria Amador, his son. Sergeant Pedro 
Amador was one of the prominent settlers of California. He 
was an adventurer and a soldier in the Spanish army, coming 
to California in 1771 and after serving in San Diego and Santa 
Barbara was transferred to San Francisco, and died in San Jose 
April 10, 1824, at the age of 82 years. His son, Jose Maria, was 
born in San Francisco, on December 18, 1794, and was also 
a soldier and a renowned Lidian fighter. He obtained a large 
grant from the Mexican government, and after the discovery 
of gold forsook pastoral pursuits and went to the Southern 



310 CALIFORNIA 

mines, where he greatly increased his fortune. He was living as 
late as 1883. 

Butte County — Created February 18, 1850. This is one of 
the original twenty-seven counties of the State of California, 
and derived its name from that wonderful topographical forma- 
tion, now known as the Marysville or Sutter Buttes, which lie 
in Sutter County and which were named by Michel La Fram- 
beau of the Hudson Bay Company, who visited the northern 
part of California as a voyageur and trapper in the year 1829. 
The word ''butte" is purely a French word, and signifies "a 
small hill or mound of earth detached from any mountain 
range." 

Calaveras County — Created February 18, 1850. One of the 
original twenty-seven counties of California. The meaning of 
"Calaveras" is "skulls," and the county derived its name 
from Calaveras Creek, which was so named by Captain Moraga 
of the Mexican army, who headed the first exploring expedi- 
tion of the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers and into the 
Sierra Nevada Mountains, from the fact that he found a large 
number of skulls lying along the banks of the creek. Ac- 
cording to the diary of Captain Moraga, the history of this 
abundance of skulls is that the tribes who lived on the Sacra- 
mento and San Joaquin rivers made a desperate war against 
the tribes of the Sierra, who annually came down to fish for 
salmon in these rivers. This was considered in the light of a 
trespass, inasmuch as the Sierra tribes refused to allow the val- 
ley tribes to go into the mountains to hunt deer and gather 
acorns. In a most sanguinary battle fought near this creek, 
the tribes of the valley were victorious, and more than three 
thousand Indians were killed. Hence the name of the creek, 
from which the county subsequently derived its name, 

Colusa County — Created February 18, 1850. This is one of 
the original twenty-seven counties of the State of California. 
The name of this county in the original act of 1850 was spelled 
"Colusi," and ofttimes in newspapers was spelled "Coluse," 
and was the name of an Indian tribe living on the west side of 



APPENDIX 311 

the Sacramento River. The meaning of the word "Colusa" 
has never been determined. 

Ed. Note. — Hon. John P. Irish, former Naval Officer at San 
Francisco, writes as follows regarding the name of this county : 

"Reading the derivation of the names of California coun- 
ties, written by Mr. Prentiss Maslin, I note that he finds no 
meaning or translation of the Indian word 'Colusa,' the title 
of the tribe from which the county was named. The late Gen- 
eral Will Green, who went there while the tribe was still a 
strong body and associated with them so much as to acquire 
a knowledge and quite free use of their language, told me that 
the word 'Colusa' means * scratch er.' When a member of the 
tribe married, it was the privilege of the bride to begin the 
honeymoon by scratching her husband's face. The young wo- 
men so uniformly availed themselves of this privilege that a 
newly married man was always known by the deep scratches 
upon his face inflicted by his wife. From this tribal custom 
the tribe was known as Colusa or the scratchers. General 
Green was always so correct in the knowledge he acquired and 
imparted as to such matters that I am very certain this is the 
exact and correct meaning of the word 'Colusa.' " 

Contra Costa County — Created February 18, 1850. One of 
the original twenty-seven counties of the State of California. 
This county originally included what is now known as Ala- 
meda County, and because of its relationship to San Fran- 
cisco County, on the west side of San Francisco Bay, it was 
called Contra Costa, or "opposite Coast," lying as it does on 
the opposite coast or eastern shore of San Francisco Bay. 

Del Norte County — Created March 2, 1857. The name of this 
county signifies "the north," and the county being situated 
in the extreme north (west) corner of the State of California, 
derived its name from its geographical position. 

El Dorado County — Created February 18, 1850. This is one 
of the original twenty-seven counties of the State of California. 
Francis Orellana, a companion of the adventurer Pizarro, wrote 
a fictitious account of a wonderful province in South America, 



312 CALIFORNIA 

of a fabulous region of genial clime and never-fading verdure, 
abounding in gold and precious stones, where wine gushed 
forth from never-ceasing springs, and wheat fields grew ready- 
baked loaves of bread, and birds already roasted flew among 
the trees, and nature was filled with harmony and sweetness. 
From this description, a gold-bearing belt was called El Do- 
rado, as in later days it has been called Klondike. So when the 
discovery of gold by James W. Marshall at Coloma in January, 
1848, became known to the world, California, and particularly 
that part where gold was discovered, was called "El Dorado," 
and it was from this fact that the county was given its name 
upon its creation. 

Fresno County— Created April 19, 1856. The word ' ' Fresno ' ' 
in Spanish signifies "ash tree," and it was because of the 
abundance of mountain ash in the mountains of this county 
that it received its name. 

Glenn County — Created March 11, 1891. This county was 
created out of the northern portion of Colusa County, and 
derived its name from Dr. Hugh J. Glenn, who, during his 
lifetime, was the largest wheat farmer in the State, and a man 
of great prominence in political and commercial life in Cali- 
fornia. 

Humboldt County— Created May 12, 1853. This county de- 
rived its name from Humboldt Bay, which was named for Baron 
Alexander von Humboldt, the eminent scientist, by Captain 
Ottinger of the ship "Laura Virginia." 

Imperial County — Created August 15, 1907. It derived its 
name from the Imperial Valley, situated therein. 

Inyo County — Created March 22, 1866. This county de- 
rived its name from a tribe of Indians who inhabited that part 
of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. The meaning of this word 
has never been determined. 

Kern County — Created April 2, 1866. This county derived 
its name from the Kern River, which was named for the lieu- 
tenant of that name of General John C. Fremont's third ex- 
pedition in 1845-47. 



APPENDIX 313 

Kings County — Created March 22, 1893. This county was 
created out of the western part of Tulare County, and derived 
its name from Kings River, which, according to history and 
tradition, was discovered in 1805 by an exploring expedition 
and named Rio de los Santos Reyes (the "river of the holy 
kings"), from which it obtained its present name. 

Lake County — Created May 20, 1861. This county derived 
its name because of the many charming lakes that are within 
its boundaries. 

Lassen County — Created April 1, 1864. The name of this 
county was derived from Mount Lassen, which was named for 
Peter Lassen, a native of Switzerland, one of General Fre- 
mont's guides and a famous trapper, frontiersman, and Indian 
fighter, who was killed by the Piutes at the base of this moun- 
tain in 1859. 

Los Angeles County — Created February 18, 1850. This coun- 
ty was one of the original twenty-seven of the State of Cali- 
fornia. The words "Los Angeles" literally mean "the an- 
gels," and are a contraction of the original name "Pueblo del 
Rio de Nuestra Senora La Reina de Los Angeles de Porciun- 
cula" (the town of the river of Our Lady, Queen of the An- 
gels). It will therefore be observed that Los Angeles was 
really named for the Virgin Mary, commonly called "Our 
Lady of the Angels" by the Spanish. On September 7, 1781, 
Governor Felipe de Neve issued orders from the San Gabriel 
Mission for the establishment of a pueblo on El Rio Nuestra 
Senora de Los Angeles and under the protection of Nuestra 
Senora La Reina de Los Angeles (Our Lady, Queen of the 
Angels), the mission by this name having been dedicated three 
days before, having practically the same title. This pueblo 
in time became known as the Ciudad de Los Angeles, "the 
City of the Angels," and it is from this that the county de- 
rived its patronymic. 

Madera County— Created March 11, 1893. "Madera" in 
Spanish signifies "timber," and the county derived its name 
from the town of Madera, situated within its limits, which town 
was originally surrounded by groves of trees. 



314 CALIFORNIA 

Marin County— Created February 18, 1850. This county 
is one of the original twenty-seven counties of the State of 
California, and derived its name from Chief Marin, of the 
Licatiut Tribe of Indians who inhabited that section of Cali- 
fornia. In 1815, a military expedition of the Spanish proceed- 
ed to explore the country north of the bay of San Francisco. 
This action aroused the ire of the Licatiut tribe, and a desper- 
ate engagement was fought in the valley now known as the 
Petaluma Valley. Chief Marin led the forces of the Indians 
with wonderful strategy and bravery that called forth the ad- 
miration of his enemies. At the same time, his sub-chief, Quen- 
tin, gave battle to a second division of the Spanish army at the 
point which still bears his name, Punta de la Quentin. Chief 
Marin afterwards was Christianized and baptized under the 
name of "Marinero," the "Mainer," by the padres, because of 
the fact of his intimate knowledge of the bay of San Francisco, 
on which he often acted as ferryman for the whites. 

Mariposa County — Created February 18, 1850. One of the 
original twenty-seven counties of the State of California. This 
county took its name from the Mariposa River. The meaning 
of "Mariposa" in the language of the Spanish is "butterfly." 
There is some doubt as to how this stream derived its name. 
According to one story, in June, 1807, a party of Californians 
from the San Joaquin Valley made one of their annual excur- 
sions into the Sierra Nevada Mountains for the purpose of hunt- 
ing elk. Camping upon the banks of a river they were charmed 
and delighted with the butterflies of most gorgeous and varie- 
gated colors that hovered around them in countless numbers, 
and because of this they gave to the stream the name "Mari- 
posa." Another beautiful story, and probably more authentic, 
is that the first explorers in the mountains of that region be- 
held for the first time a beautiful lily growing everywhere, gay- 
colored, spotted, and in some respects resembling the wings of a 
butterfly. In their admiration, they gave to this dainty flower, 
the Caloehortus, the name Mariposa (butterfly) lily, 

Mendocino County — Created February 18, 1850. One of the 
original twenty-seven counties of the State of California. This 



APPENDIX 315 

county derived its name from Cape Mendocino, which was dis- 
covered and named by Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo in 1542, and 
named for Don Antonio de Mendoza, the first viceroy of New 
Spain, or Mexico, appointed by the King of Spain in 1535. 

Merced County— Created April 19, 1855. This county de- 
rived its name from the Merced River, which was originally 
named by the Spanish "Rio de Nuestra Senora de la Merced," 
meaning "the river of Our Lady of Mercy." 

Modoc County — Created February 17, 1874. This county 
derived its name from a fierce tribe of Indians by that name, 
which means "the head of the river," and who lived at the 
headwaters of the Pitt River. 

Note — Gen. 0. 0. Howard, in an article in the St. Nicholas 
Magazine for May, 1908, page 624, states that the Indian name 
of the tribe of which the name Modoc is a corruption is "Mak- 
laks," and means "The People." 

Mono County — Created April 24, 1861. The name of this 
county is a Spanish word meaning "monkey," and was applied 
to an Indian tribe living in that section of the State. 

Monterey County — Created February 18, 1850. This coun- 
ty is one of the original twenty-seven counties of the State of 
California. It derived its name from the bay of Monterey. 
The word itself is composed of the Spanish words "monte" 
and "rey," and literally means "king of the forest." The 
bay was discovered by Sebastian Vizcaino in 1603, and named 
in honor of his friend and patron, Gaspar de Zuniga, Count 
of Monterey and viceroy of Mexico. 

Napa County — Created February 18, 1850. One of the orig- 
inal twenty-seven counties of the State of California. The 
word "Napa" means, in the language of a large and powerful 
tribe of Indians that lived in that section of California, "fish," 
and was given because of the myriads of fish that inhabited the 
Napa River and other creeks of this section. This tribe of 
Indians was nearly exterminated by smallpox in 1838, and now 
the only evidence of their ever having existed is the name given 
to this county. 



316 CALIFORNIA 

Nevada County— Created April 25, 1851. The word "Ne- 
vada" in Spanish means "snowy." The county derived its 
name from the fact of the perpetual snow-capped mountains 
within its boundaries. 

Orange County — Created March 11, 1889. This county was 
given its name by the Legislature because of the orange groves 
for which it is justly famous. 

Placer County — Created April 25, 1851. "Placer" is prob- 
ably a contraction of the words "Plaza de oro," the place of 
gold, and means in Spanish "a place near a river where gold 
is found." The county derived its name from the numerous 
places therein where that method of extracting the gold from 
the earth, called placer mining, was practiced. 

Plumas County — Created March 18, 1854. The Spanish 
originally called one of the tributaries of the Sacramento River, 
Rio de las Plumas, or the "River of the Feathers." The 
Americans subsequently robbed this river of its beautiful name, 
by changing its euphonious Spanish title to the English equiv- 
alent, the Feather River, but the Legislature, in creating this 
county, gave thereto the name of "Plumas," because of the 
fact that all of the numerous branches of the Feather River 
have their origin in the mountains of this county. 

Riverside County — Created March 11, 1893. This county 
was created from San Diego and San Bernardino counties, and 
derived its name from the town of Riverside. 

Sacramento County — Created February 18, 1850. This coun- 
ty is one of the original twenty-seven counties of the State of 
California. "Sacramento" signifies "Sacrament, or Lord's 
Supper." Captain Moraga first gave the name "Jesus Maria" 
(Jesus Mary) to the main river, and the name "Sacramento" 
to a branch thereof. Later, the main river became known as 
the Sacramento, while the branch became known as El Rio 
de las Plumas, or Feather River. 

San Benito County — Created February 12, 1874. Crespi in 
his expedition in 1772 named a small river in honor of San 
Benedicto (Saint Benedict, "the Blessed"), the patron saint of 



APPENDIX 317 

the married, and it is from the contraction of the name of this 
beloved saint that this county took its name. 

San Bernardino — Created April 26, 1853. Saint Bernard is 
the patron saint of mountain passes. The name "Bernardino" 
means "bold as a bear." The Spanish gave to the snow-capped 
peak in Southern California the name of San Bernardino in 
honor of the saint, and from this the county derived its name. 

San Diego County — Created February 18, 1850. One of the 
original twenty-seven counties of the State of California. On 
November 12, 1603, the day of San Diego de Alcala (Saint 
James of Alcala), Sebastian Vizcaino anchored his fleet in the 
bay of San Diego, and named the same in honor of the day, as 
well as in honor of his flagship, which name has since been 
retained, although Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo named this bay San 
Miguel on September 28, 1542, sixty-one years previous ; and it 
is from this bay that the county derived its name. 

San Francisco County — Created February 18, 1850. This 
county is one of the original twenty-seven counties of the State 
of California. The sixth mission in California was established 
by Padre Junipero Serra, October 9, 1776, and was named "Mis- 
sion San Francisco de Asis a la Laguna de los Dolores" (Saint 
Francis of Assisi at the Lagoon of Sorrows), and to this mis- 
sion San Francisco owes its name. 

San Joaquin County — Created February 18, 1850. This is 
one of the original twenty-seven counties of the State of Cali- 
fornia. The meaning of the name of this county has a very 
ancient origin and refers to the parentage of Mary, the mother 
of Christ. According to tradition, Joachim signifies "whom 
Jehovah hath appointed," and hence the belief that Joaquin, 
the Spanish spelling for Joachim, was the father of Mary. In 
1813, Lieutenant Moraga, commanding an expedition in the 
lower great central valley of California, gave to a small rivulet, 
which springs from the Sierra Nevada Mountains and empties 
into Buena Vista Lake, the name of San Joaquin, and it is 
from this that the present river derived its name, which in turn 
baptized the county with the same. 



318 CALIFORNIA 

Ban Luis Obispo County — Created February 18, 1850. One 
of the original twenty-seven counties of the State of Cali- 
fornia. On September 1, 1772, the Mission San Luis Obispo 
(Saint Louis the Bishop) was established and was named for 
Saint Louis, the Bishop of Toulouse. He was the son of Charles 
of Anjou, King of Naples, and the county derived its name 
from this mission, founded by the padres, Junipero Serra and 
Jose Cavalier. 

San Mateo County — Created April 19, 1856. This county 
bears the Spanish name of Saint Matthew, "the gift of Je- 
hovah." 

Santa Barbara Comity — Created February 18, 1850. This 
county is one of the original twenty-seven counties of the State 
of California. Saint Barbara is the patron of the sailors, and 
gives them special protection from deadly lightning and fires 
at sea. For this reason her name is frequently seen over the 
powder magazines on board of war vessels. Santa Barbara 
received this name from Sebastian Vizcaino, when he sailed 
over these waters on the Saint's day, December 4, 1603; and 
when Padre Junipero Serra established a mission near this 
channel on December 4, 1786, he named it Santa Barbara, Vir- 
gen y Martir (Saint Barbara, Virgin and Martyr). It is from 
these two sources that the county derived its name. 

Santa Clara County — Created February 18, 1850. One of the 
original twenty-seven counties of the State of California. On 
January 12, 1777, Mission Santa Clara was established, and 
named for Saint Clara of Assisi, Italy, the first Franciscan nun 
and founder of the Order of Saint Clara. Her name "Clara" 
means "clear" or "bright," and according to the Roman Book 
of Martyrs, as Hortalana, the pious mother of this nun, was 
once kneeling before a crucifix, praying earnestly that she 
might be happily delivered of her unborn babe, she heard a 
voice whispering, "Fear not, woman, thou wilt safely bring 
forth"; whereupon a brilliant light suddenly illumined the 
place, and the mother, inspired by the mysterious prediction, 
baptized her child Clara, which is the feminine of the word 



APPENDIX 319 

meaning clear or bright. Clara was afterwards sanctified on 
account of her many eminent virtues, and accordingly venerated 
by the Catholics in all Roman Catholic churches, and canonized 
under the name Saint Clara. 

Santa Cruz County — Created February 18, 1850. This is one 
of the original twenty-seven counties of the State of California. 
"Santa" is the Spanish feminine of "Saint" or "holy"; 
"Cruz" is the Spanish for "cross," and "Santa Cruz" signifies 
' ' holy cross, ' ' which emblem was to the devout explorers of Cal- 
ifornia what it was to the Crusaders. Those who fell by the 
wayside had a rude cross erected over them to mark their last 
resting-place; if anything notable occurred in any of the ex- 
peditions, a cross was set up, and all that marked the site of the 
mission which was founded by Padres Lopez and Salazar on 
September 25, 1791, was the memorial cross erected to mark 
this site. From this the county derived its name. 

Shasta County — Created February 18, 1850. This county is 
one of the original twenty-seven counties of the State of Cali- 
fornia. The derivation of the name of the county, which was 
taken from the butte of that name, is in doubt. Some author- 
ities claim the name "Shasta" to be derived from Shas-ti-ka, 
the name of a tribe of Indians that lived at the base of this 
mountain. The word "Shas-ti-ka" means "stone house or cave 
dwellers." Other authorities claim that the word "Shasta" is 
a corruption of the French word "chaste," and was first ap- 
plied by explorers because of the wonderful whiteness or chas- 
tity of the eternal snow that caps the summit of this wonderful 
peak. 

Sierra County— Created April 16, 1852. "Sierra" is the 
Spanish word for "saw," and was applied to the chain of 
mountains. Sierra Nevada, meaning "snow saw," because of 
the jagged, serrated or saw-tooth peaks which form the sky- 
line of this range of mountains, and the county that bears the 
name "Sierra" was so called because of the jagged peaks 
within its borders. 

Siskiyou County — Created March 22, 1852. The word Siski- 
you has never been authentically determined. It has generally 



320 CALIFORNIA 

been assumed that this is the name of a tribe of Indians inhab- 
iting this region, but there are several stories regarding its 
derivation and meaning. Senator Jacob R. Snyder of San 
Francisco, who advocated the formation of this county, in an 
argument delivered April 14, 1852, in the Senate of the State 
of California, stated that the French name "Six Callieux" was 
given to a ford on the Umpqua River at which place Michel 
La Frambeau, who led a party of Hudson Bay Company trap- 
pers, crossed in the year 1832. Six large stones or rocks lay 
in the river where they crossed, and they gave it the name of 
"Six Callieux" or "Six-stone Ford," and from this the moun- 
tain or butte derived its name, which was subsequently given 
to the county when created. 

Solano County — Created February 18, 1850. This county is 
one of the original twenty-seven counties of the State of Cali- 
fornia. "Solano" in Spanish means "east wind," and was 
the second name of the celebrated missionary Francisco Solano. 
When the chief of the powerful tribe of Suisunes Indians, which 
inhabited the west side of Jbhe River Jesus Maria, was christian- 
ized, he was by this missionary baptized Solano, and as his 
residence was in the valley of Suisun, the name Solano was 
given to this county. 

Sonoma County — Created February 18, 1850. This county 
is one of the original twenty-seven counties of the State of Cali- 
fornia. "Sonoma" is an Indian word meaning "Valley of the 
moon," because of the resemblance of this valley to the shape 
of the orb. In 1824, when Padre Jose Actimira baptized the 
chief of the Cho-cuy-en Indians, he gave him the baptismal 
name of Sonoma, and from this source the county derived its 
name. 

Stanislaus County — Created April 1, 1854. Chief Estanislao, 
of a powerful tribe of Indians who lived on what is known now 
as the Stanislaus River, but by the Indians called the La-kisk- 
um-na, was educated at the Mission San Jose. He became a 
renegade and incited his tribe against the Spaniards, but was 
defeated in 1826 in a fierce battle on this river, which was 



APPENDIX 321 

afterwards called Stanislaus for the defeated Indian chief. It 
is from this river that the county derived its name. 

Sutter County— Created February 18, 1850. This is one of 
the original twenty-seven counties of the State of California. 
Sutter County was named after General John Augustus Sutter, 
a native of Switzerland, and a soldier of fortune. He first 
arrived in San Francisco July 2, 1839, obtained a large grant 
from the Mexican government, and called his first settlement 
New Helvetia, which is now the city of Sacramento. 

Tehama County— Created April 9, 1856. "Tehama" is the 
name of a tribe of Indians which originally inhabited that part 
of the State which now bears its name. The meaning of the 
word has never been determined. 

Trinity County— Created February 18, 1850. This is one of 
the original twenty-seven counties of the State of California. 
This county derived its name from Trinidad Bay, which was 
discovered and named by Captain Bruno Ezeta on June 11, 
1775, a date that happened to be Trinity Sunday. The Spanish 
charts of the bay were misleading, and Major Reading and 
others thought that the river he named Trinity emptied into 
this bay. 

Tulare County — Created April 20, 1852. Comandante Fages, 
while hunting for deserters in 1773, discovered a great 
lake surrounded by marshes and filled with rushes, which he 
named Los Tules (the tules, Scirpus lacrustus). In 1813, 
Captain Moraga on his exploring expedition, passed through 
the valley of this lake, and named it "Valle de los Tules" 
(valley of the tules), from which this county takes its name. 

Tuolumne County — Created February 18, 1850. This county 
is one of the original twenty-seven counties of the State of Cali- 
fornia. "Tuolumne" is a corruption of the Indian word 
"Talmalamne," which signifies "stone houses or caves," the 
same as the word "Shasta," but in another language. This 
was the name of a large tribe of Indians who lived on both 
sides of the river now bearing that name, from which the 
county derived its patronymic. 



322 CALIFORNIA 

Ventura County— Created March 22, 1872. On March 30, 
1782, Padres Junipero Serra and Cambon dedicated a Mission 
at San Buenaventura to San Buenaventura, Doctor Serafico (St. 
Bonaventura, Serafic Doctor), which is the name under which 
Giovani de Fidanza of Tuscany was canonized. Buenaventura 
is composed of two Spanish words, "Buena," meaning "good," 
and "Ventura," meaning "fortune"; hence the name signifies 
"good fortune." The county took its name from the latter 
Spanish word "Ventura." San Buenaventura has at aU times 
been the name of the town, but this beautiful and euphonious 
name has been abbreviated by the United States Post Office 
Department to "Ventura." 

Yolo County — Created February 18, 1850. This is one of the 
original twenty-seven counties of the State of California. 
"Yolo" is a corruption of an Indian tribal name "Yo-loy," 
meaning "a place thick with rushes." This tribe was a branch 
of the Suisunes, and inhabited the marshes immediately west 
of Rio de Jesus Maria (now known as the Sacramento River). 

Yuba County — Created February 18, 1850. This is one of the 
original twenty-seven counties of the State of California. 
"Yuba" is a corruption of the Spanish word signifying "wild 
grape." A Spanish exploring expedition in 1824 found im- 
mense quantities of vines shading the banks of a river, which 
is the chief tributary of the Feather River. These vines were 
heavily laden with wild grapes (called Uvas silvestres in Span- 
ish), and the river was therefore caUed the Uva or Uba, and 
by a corruption of the word "Uba" the river eventually be- 
came known by its present name, "Yuba," from which the 
county derived its name. 



CELEBRATED "PIOUS FUND" 

In order to preserve a reliable and readable statement of the 
celebrated "Pious Fund of California," the history and ulti- 
mate disposition of which has been the subject of such wide- 
spread discussion, the following narrative, deposited by John 
T. Doyle in the archives of the California Historical Society, is 
here reproduced : 

From the time of the discovery of California [Lower], in 
1534, by the expedition fitted out by Cortes, the colonization 
of that country and the conversion of its inhabitants to the 
Catholic faith were cherished objects with the Spanish Mon- 
archs. Many expeditions for the purpose were set on foot, at 
the expense of the Crown, during the century and a half suc- 
ceeding the discovery, but though attended with enormous 
expense, none of them was productive of the slightest result. 
Down to the year 1697 the Spanish Monarchs had failed to 
acquire any permanent foothold in the vast territory which 
they claimed, under the name of California. 

The success of the Jesuit Fathers in their Missions on the 
northwestern frontier of Mexico, and elsewhere, induced the 
Spanish Government as early as 1643 (when fitting out an 
expedition for California under Admiral Pedro Portal de Casa- 
nate), to invite that religious order to take charge of the 
spiritual administration of it, and the country for which it was 
destined; and they accepted the charge; but that expedition, 
like all its predecessors, failed. 

The last expedition undertaken by the Crown was equipped 
in pursuance of a royal cedula of December 29, 1679. It was 
confided to the command of Admiral Isidro Otondo, and the 
spiritual administration of the country was again entrusted to 
the Jesuits, the celebrated Father Kino being appointed Cos- 
mografo Mayor of the expedition. 

..L .. 



324 CALIFORNIA 

Various circumstances conspired to delay its departure, and 
it only sailed on the 18th of March, 1683. Many precautions 
had been taken to ensure its success, but after three years of 
ineffectual effort and an expenditure of over $225,000, it was 
also abandoned as a failure, and at a junta general, assembled 
in the City of Mexico, under the auspices of the Viceroy, 
wherein the whole subject was carefully reviewed, it was deter- 
mined that "the reduction of California, by the means hereto- 
fore relied on, was a simple impossibility," and that the only 
mode of accomplishing it was to invite the Jesuits to undertake 
its whole charge, at the expense of the Crown. This proposition 
was made; but it would seem that the conduct of the royal 
officers, civil and military, must have contributed to the previous 
failures, and probably for that reason it was declined by the 
society; although the services of its members as missionaries 
were always freely placed at the disposal of the Government. 

Individual members of the society, however, animated by a 
zeal for the spread of the Christian faith in California, proposed 
to undertake the whole charge of the conversion of the country 
and its reduction to Christianity and civilization, and without 
expense to the Crown, on condition that they might themselves 
gelect the civil and military officers to be employed. This plan 
was finally agreed to, and on the 5th of February, 1697, the 
necessary authority was conferred on Fathers Juan Maria 
Salvatierra and Francisco Eusebio Kino, to undertake the 
reduction of California, on the express conditions: 1st, that 
possession of the country was to be taken in the name of the 
Spanish Crown, and 2d, that the royal treasury was not to be 
called on for any of the expenses of the enterprise. 

In anticipation of this result. Fathers Kino and Salvatierra 
had already solicited and received from various individuals and 
religious bodies, voluntary donations, contributed in aid of the 
enterprise. The funds thus collected were placed in their 
hands, in trust, to be applied to the propagation of the Catholic 
faith in California, by preaching, the administration of the 
sacraments of the church, erection of church edifices, the found- 
ing of religious schools, and the like ; in a word, by the institu- 



APPENDIX 325 

tion of Catholic missions there, under the system so successfully 
pursued by the Jesuits in Paraguay, Northern Mexico, Canada, 
India, and elsewhere. 

At a time when California is coming into the enjoyment of the 
benefactions of more modern philanthropists, and we are paying 
honor to the still living and recently deceased benefactors of our 
State, it is not unfitting to give the names of the earliest and 
most important contributors to the fund on which the conquest 
of California and its reclamation from the dominion of the sav- 
age were founded. They were Don Alonzo Davalos, Conde de 
Miravalles and Don Mateo Fernandez de la Cruz, Marquez de 
Buena Vista, who gave $1000 each. By their example others 
were induced to subscribe, and, in a short time, $15,000 more 
were made up, $5000 in cash and $10,000 in promises. Don 
Pedro Gil de la Sierpe, treasurer of Acapulco, offered the use of 
a galiot to transport the missionaries to their destination, and 
the gift of a small boat or launch. Considering the remoteness 
and isolation of the field, it was determined to establish a sepa- 
rate special fund or capital, the income from which should form 
a permanent endowment for the missionary church. Towards 
this latter object the first recorded contributions seem to have 
been by the congregation of N. S. de los Dolores, of the City of 
Mexico, which contributed $10,000, and Don Juan Caballero y 
Ozio, who donated $20,000 more, besides giving Father Salva- 
tierra the comforting assurance, that in any unforeseen emer- 
gency, he might draw on him for whatever money he needed, 
and he would honor his drafts, large or small. 

This endowment fund, commenced by the pious liberality of 
the society and the individuals just named, was increased by 
subsequent donations. The capital was invested as securely as 
possible, and as an income of $500 per annum was deemed 
necessary for each Mission, and five per cent, was the then 
current rate on safe investments, a capital of $10,000 was made 
the basis of each new Mission founded. 

I suppose it soon became the correct thing for a wealthy 
Mexican to found a Mission in California; and as the founder 
was allowed the privilege of having it called by a name of his 



326 CALIFORNIA 

own selection, gentlemen so disposed had the satisfaction of 
recording their preferences. It seems to me I have seen some- 
thing that my scientific friends would probably call a survival 
of this notion, in modern fairs for charitable or religious pur- 
poses, where a sword is voted to a favorite soldier, or a walking 
cane to a popular clergyman, a contribution of some small sum 
constituting the title to a vote. 

In this way the following Missions were founded in the penin- 
sula. I give names of the contributors and the dates of foun- 
dation opposite each : 
No. Date. Name of Mission. Founder. 

1. 1698 — Our Lady of Loretto . . . D. Juan Caballero y Ozio 

2. 1698 — St. Francis Xavier . . . D. Juan Caballero y Ozio 

3. 1700 — Santa Eosalia (Mulexe) . . D. Nicholas de Arteaga 

4. 1701 — Los Dolores . . Congregation of that Name in Mexico 

5. 1704 — San Jose (Commundu) . . Marques de Villa Puente 

6. 1709 — N. S. de Guadaloupe . . . Marques de Villa Puente 

7. 1713 — La Purisima Concepcion . . Marques de Villa Puente 

8. 1718 — San Luis ...... Don Luis Velasco 

9. 1719 — Santiago ...... Don Luis Velasco 

10. 1725 — San Ignacio Padre Juan Luyando 

11. 1730 — San Jose del Cabo Marques de Villa Puente 

12. 1731 — Santa Rosa Dona Rosa de la Pala 

13. 1757 — San Francisco de Borja Duchess of Gandia 

These sums of money forming a considerable capital, held on 

investment, received, by common consent, the name of "The 
Pious Fund of the Missions of California," or, more briefly, the 
"Pious Fund of California." 

In the first half of the last century there was living in Mexico 
a gentleman of great wealth and large ideas, whose name has 
already been mentioned, the Marques de Villa Puente. His 
wife, the Marchioness de las Torres de Rada, was also possessed 
of great wealth, and she entirely shared the sentiments of her 
husband. He was a patriot as well as a man of sincere and 
earnest piety, and as he was probably the most munificent 
patron of the Pious Fund, it is fitting some account should be 
given of him. I translate from Alegre's History of the Society 
of Jesus in New Spain the following notice of him under the 
date of 1739 : 



APPENDIX 327 

"The chronicle of events in California for this year would be incom- 
plete if we failed to mention the irreparable loss which that country 
sustained, of its most distinguished benefactor, the illustrious Jose de la 
Puente, Pena y Castrejon, Marquis of Villa Puente, who might indeed 
with propriety be termed the fountain and treasury of kindness to our 
whole society and to the Christian world. It may with truth be said 
of him, that there was in his day no pious enterprise to which he failed 
to contribute, thanking the Almighty for every opportunity of doing 
good to the poor. It was also specially the rule of his conduct, in con- 
tributing to relieve their temporal wants, never to forget the spiritual 
comfort of their souls. By this means he became in his life time, and 
remains to this day, the apostle of many people and nations, which the 
establishments and missions founded by him daily redeem from the 
darkness of infidelity and sin. In Africa, besides remitting at various 
times large sums of money for the ransom of Christian captives, he 
founded, in Algiers, an hospital under the care of the Franciscan Friars, 
for their succor and spiritual comfort. In Asia, at great expense, he 
succeeded in alleviating the vexatious annoyances to which, in the king- 
doms of China and Japan, innumerable Christians were continually sub- 
jected for the faith of Jesus Christ. For the support of missionaries and 
catechists, and the building of churches in those countries, he sent on 
different occasions more than $100,000. In Macao he founded a house 
or cradle of mercy, for the rescue of foundlings, who, according to the 
barbarous custom there prevailing among the poor, are daily found ex- 
posed in the streets. For the same purpose of supporting ministers and 
catechists, he remitted enormous sums to the Kingdoms of Travancor, 
Ternate, Madure and Coromandel, thus supporting those flourishing 
churches, which but for such timely succor were in frequent danger of 
being overwhelmed by the continued hostilities of those pagans. In 
the Philippines he founded a Presidio of Boholan Indians as a protection 
against the attacks of the Mahomedans, which prevented the spread of 
the gospel. He built in the East Indies the Church of Pondicheri, and 
remitted to Jerusalem large sums of money for the ornament of the 
holy places, and the security of pious pilgrims. 

"In America, besides continued daily alms to the afflicted and poor, 
numerous dowries bestowed on virtuous maidens, chapels and pious 
works of the same nature, and others less costly, he expended over 
$80,000 in building the convent of St. Joseph of the barefooted Fran- 
ciscan Friars, at Tacubaya, and over $200,000 in missions, vessels, and 
other necessities of California. He founded in Pimeria (Arizona) the 
two missions of Busonic and Sonoydad, changing the name of San 
Marcelo, by which the latter was formerly known, to that of San Miguel, 
from devotion to the latter Saint. He contributed $10,000 towards the 
founding of the college of Caracas, and $10,000 more to that of Havana, 
and another $10,000 towards founding a house of religious exercises in 



328 CALIFORNIA 

Mexico. The Missions of Nayarit of Moqui and New Mexico were not 
a little indebted for hia support. In Europe he defrayed the whole ex- 
penses of the investigations preceding the beatification of the venerable 
Father Luis de la Puente; he rebuilt and re-endowed the college of 
Santander; built and endowed the college and church of the cave of 
Manresa — the scene of the penance of our Father St. Ignatius, and the 
cradle of the Society. He laid the foundation of a college of mission- 
aries at the house and castle of Xavier, in the kingdom of Navarre; 
served his Majesty, Philip V., with a regiment of five hundred and 
seventy men, armed and maintained at his own expense, for nearly a 
year and a half, in acknowledgment of which service his Majesty of- 
fered him the vice-royalty of Mexico, an honor which he declined, pre- 
ferring to all other things, the tranquillity of his own conscience. 

"In his extreme old age, he made a pilgrimage to the house of 
Nazareth, and the city of Loretto, clad in a garment of coarse cloth, 
and under a vow not to shave his beard until he had offered up his de- 
votions at that sacred place. There he made most munificent offerings 
to the Holy Virgin. Throughout his journey he distributed profuse 
alms. He went then to Eome, and in the College Jesu, went through 
the religious exercises of our Father, St. Ignatius. He returned to Spain, 
offered in Zaragossa most costly gifts at the church and image del 
Pilar, and sought hospitality in our imperial college at Madrid where, 
having three days before given away, in alms, all the rest of his property, 
even down to his cloak, he finally gave himself to the Lord, by seeking 
to be admitted into the Society. Having made his vows with tenderness 
and devotion, to the edification of the whole court, he died on the 13th 
day of February, 1739." 

The next important contribution to the Pious Fund after that 
of the Marquis was, I believe, made by the Duchess of Gandia. 
I have never obtained a copy of her will, but its provisions are 
to be inferred from the brief notice of it in Clavigero's "Cali- 
fornia." He said that the good lady, having heard an aged 
domestic who had served as a soldier in California recount 
the sterility of that country, the wretched condition of the 
Indians there, the hardships and apostolic labors of the mission- 
aries, etc., concluded that she could do nothing more pleasing 
to God than to devote a portion of her wealth to the support 
of these Missions, and she therefore directed in her will that the 
capital set aside to provide annuities for her servants should, 
as the life estates fell in, go to the Missions of California. He 
adds that the sums obtained by the Missions from this legacy 



APPENDIX 329 

had amounted in 1767, to $60,000, with as much more to come in 
on the termination of the remaining life estates. 

On May 29, 1765, Dona Josepha Paula de Arguelles, a wealthy- 
lady of Guadalaxara, executed her will, by which she be- 
queathed, after other provisions, one-fourth of her residuary 
estate to the Jesuit College of St. Thomas Aquinas, in Guada- 
laxara, and the other three-quarters to the "Missions in China 
and New Spain." She died about a year and a half thereafter. 
The Jesuits at that time, pressed by a storm of obloquy in Spain 
and Portugal, renounced under the will, and the heirs of the 
deceased lady brought an action to have her declared intestate 
as to all her property, except a trivial legacy. By the time the 
action was tried, the Jesuits, in whose hands at the time of the 
making of the will the Mexican and Philippine Missions were, 
had been expelled from all the Spanish dominions and all their 
property seized by the Crown. 

The Crown accordingly intervened in the action just men- 
tioned, claiming on behalf of the Missions. The Monarch as 
"Parens Patriae" recognized the fiduciary character of the 
bequest, and as the former trustee had been put out of exist- 
ence, claimed to succeed to the duties, and consequent rights of 
that position. The litigation was long and arduous, and went 
finally before the council of the Indies, on appeal from the 
Audencia real of Mexico. I have a copy of the judgment. By 
it the decedent is declared intestate, as to the quarter of her 
property bequeathed to the college, the beneficiaries having 
renounced as above mentioned; but as to the three-fourths 
bequeathed to the Missions, the bequest was sustained, and the 
money placed at the disposal of the Crown, for the fulfillment 
of the trusts. One-half of these three-fourths was therefore 
aggregated to the Pious Fund, and the other half was devoted 
to Missions in the Philippine Islands. The amount of the con- 
tribution was about $240,000. I have not been able to trace any 
other very large contributions to the Pious Fund, or I would 
gladly chronicle the names of the donors. There were prob- 
ably many contributions of importance and many more of 
moderate amounts. The contributors, however, have fallen 



330 CALIFORNIA 

into oblivion like the "mute inglorious Miltons" we have 
heard of. 

To return to the enterprise of Fathers Kino and Salvatierra, 
we find associated with them in the projected conquest Fathers 
Juan Ugarte and Francisco Maria Piccolo. The former of these 
was, it seems, possessed of decided financial and administrative 
ability ; he was a most zealous missionary, and his great stature 
and herculean personal strength inspired the Indians with a 
corresponding respect for his doctrine and preaching. Another 
instance of the truth of the proverb, "La raison du plus fort," 
etc. Some droll stories are told of him in this connection ; but 
this is not the place for them. He was not long suffered to 
remain in personal charge of a Mission, but was transferred to 
the position of procurator, or financial agent of the missionary 
establishments, at the City of Mexico, where his financial ability 
was exercised in the care, investment, and disbursement of the 
funds. Father Piccolo was a scion of a noble Italian family ; a 
scholarly man, and master of an elegant and perspicuous style, 
as his letters from California — some of which are printed in the 
"Collection des lettres Edifiantes at Curieuses" — show. 

Father Kino was unable to accompany his associates to the 
scene of their labors, and the Mission was commenced by 
Fathers Salvatierra and Piccolo, who were subsequently joined 
by Father Ugarte. It would not be out of place here to follow 
these heroic men in their apostolic labors. Father Salvatierra 
embarked at the mouth of the Yaqui River, in a crazy little 
schooner, and after what was deemed a short voyage of nine 
days reached [Lower] California. Landing in an unknown 
country, remote from all supplies and communications, the 
intrepid missionary, accompanied by a corporal and five men, 
with three Indian servants, deliberately aimed at no less an 
object than the spiritual conquest of the whole peninsula, and 
the country to the north of it, up the coast as far as Cape 
Mendocino. He was followed in a few weeks by Father Piccolo. 
The chronicle of the obstacles they surmounted, the privations, 
sufferings and perils to which they and their subsequent com- 
panions were exposed, and in which some of them cheerfully 



APPENDIX 331 

perished, and of the success they finally achieved, is as full of 
romance, interest and instruction as any in the annals of the 
New World. 

Besides the chief object of bringing the native population 
into the fold of the Church, which was ever kept steadily in 
view, the Jesuit Fathers never lost sight of the interests of 
learning and science; they faithfully observed and chronicled 
all that was of interest, in any branch of human knowledge, or 
capable of being useful to the colony or the mother country. 
It is a hundred and twenty years since the Jesuits were ex- 
pelled from Lower California, yet to this day, most of what we 
know of the geography, climate, physical peculiarities and 
natural history of the peninsula is derived from the records 
of these early missionaries. By kindness and instruction they 
gradually overcame the hostility of the native tribes and during 
the seventy succeeding years gradually extended their Missions 
from Cape San Lucas up the peninsula, to the northward, so 
that at the period of their expulsion they had established those 
already mentioned, and these, with that of San Fernando de 
Villacata, founded by the Franciscans in May, 1769, on their 
march to San Diego, were all the Missions of Lower California. 

At this time the interior of Upper California was unexplored 
and its eastern and northern boundaries uncertain. The outline 
of the coast had been mapped with more or less accuracy, by 
naval exploring expeditions fitted out by the Crown, and by the 
commanders or pilots of the Philippine galleons, which, on their 
return voyages to Acapulco, took a wide sweep to the north, 
and sighted the leading headlands, from as far north as the 
"Cabo Blanco de San Sebastian," down to Cape San Lucas. 
The whole coast, as far north as Spain claimed, was called by 
the name of California. The terms Upper and Lower California 
came into use afterwards. 

The "Pious Fund" continued to be managed by the Jesuits, 
and its income applied according to the will of its founders, and 
the Missions of California remained under their charge down to 
1768, in which year they were expelled from Mexico in pur- 
suance of the order of the Crown, or pragmatic sanction, of 



332 CALIFORNIA 

April 2, 1767. Their Missions in California were directed by 
the Viceroy to be placed in charge of the Franciscan Order. 
Subsequently a Royal Gedula of April 8, 1770, was issued, 
directing that one-half of these Missions should be confided to 
the Dominican Friars; in pursuance of which, and a "Concor- 
dato" of April 7, 1772, between the authorities of the two 
Orders, sanctioned by the Viceroy, the Missions of Lower Cali- 
fornia were confided to the Dominicans, and those of Upper 
California to the Franciscans. The income and product of the 
"Pious Fund" were thereafter appropriated to the Missions of 
both Orders. 

The Church, when first established in Upper California, was 
purely missionary in its character. Its foundation dates from 
the year 1769; in July of which year, Father Junipero Serra, 
a Franciscan Friar, and his companions, reached the port of 
San Diego, overland, from the frontier Mission of Lower Cali- 
fornia, and there founded the first Christian Mission and first 
settlement of civilized men, within the territory now comprised 
in the State of California. Their object was to convert to 
Christianity and civilize the wretched native inhabitants, sunk 
in the lowest depths of ignorance and barbarism. In pursuit of 
this they exposed themselves to all perils and privations of a 
journey of forty-five days across an unexplored wilderness, and 
a residence remote from all the conveniences and necessaries of 
civilized life, in the midst of a hostile and barbarous population. 
Father Junipero and his followers established Missions among 
these people, from San Diego as far north as Sonoma, at each 
of which the neighboring tribes of Indians were assembled and 
instructed in the truths of the Christian religion and the rudi- 
ments of the arts of civilized life. The Missions of Upper 
California, and the dates of their foundation, were as follows : 

San Diego, 1769. Santa Barbara, 1786. 

El Carmelo, 1770. La Purisima, 1787. 

San Gabriel, 1771. La Soledad, 1791. 

San Antonio, 1771. Santa Cruz, 1791. 

San Fernando, 1771. San Juan Bautista, 1797. 

San Luis Obispo, 1772. San Jose, 1797. 



APPENDIX 333 

San Francisco de Assisi, 1776. San Miguel, 1797. 

San Juan Capistrano, 1776. San Luis Rey, 1798, 

Santa Clara, 1777. Santa Ynez, 1802. 

San Buenaventura, 1782. San Rafael, 1817. 

San Francisco Solano, 1823. 
The Missions were designed, when the population should be 
sufficiently instructed, to be converted into parish churches 
and maintained as such, as had already been done in other 
parts of the Viceroyalty of New Spain ; but in the meantime, 
and while their missionary character continued, they were 
under the ecclesiastical government of a President of the Mis- 
sions. Father Serra was the first who occupied this office, and 
the Missions were governed and directed by him and his suc- 
cessors, as such, down to the year 1836. 

The decree of pragmatic sanction expelling the Jesuits from 
the Spanish dominions directs the seizure into the hands of the 
Crown of all their temporalities. Under this provision, the 
Crown took all the estates of the Order into its possession, in- 
cluding those of the "Pious Fund"; but these latter, consti- 
tuting a trust estate, were of course taken cum onere, and 
charged with the trust. This was fully recognized by the 
Crown, and the properties of the "Pious Fund," so held in 
trust, were thereafter managed in its name by officers appointed 
for the purpose, called a "junta directiva. " The income and 
product continued to be devoted, through the instrumentality 
of the ecclesiastical authorities, to the religious uses for which 
they were dedicated by the donors. 

On the declaration of Mexican independence, Mexico suc- 
ceeded to the Crown of Spain as trustee of the "Pious Fund " 
and it continued to be managed, and its income applied as 
before, down to September 19, 1836, when the condition of the 
Church, and of the missionary establishments in California, 
seemed to render desirable the erection of the country into a 
diocese or bishopric and the selection of a bishop for its gov- 
ernment. In compliance with the known rule of the Holy See 
not to consent to the erection of new bishoprics in countries 
acknowledging the Catholic faith, without an endowment ade- 



334 CALIFORNIA 

qimte to the decent support of the bishopric, the law of the 
Mexican Congress of September 19, 1836, was passed, which 
attached an endowment of $6000 per year to the mitre to be 
founded, and conceded to the incumbent when selected, and his 
successors, the administration and disposal of the "Pious 
Fimd." 

In pursuance of the invitation held out in this enactment, the 
two Californias, Upper and Lower, were erected by his Holiness 
Pope Gregory XVI, into an episcopal diocese, and Francisco 
Garcia Diego, who had until that time been President of the 
Missions of Upper California, was made bishop of the newly 
constituted See; as such he took upon himself the administra- 
tion, management and investment of the "Pious Fund" as 
trustee, as well as the application of its income and proceeds 
to the purposes of its foundation, and for the benefit of his 
flock. 

On February 8, 1842, so much of the law of September 19, 
1836, as confided the management, investment, etc., of the fimd 
to the bishop, was abrogated by a decree of Santa Ana, then 
President of the Republic, and the trust was again devolved 
on the State; but that decree did not purport in any way to 
impair or alter the destination of the fund ; it merely devolved 
on government officers the investment and management of the 
property belonging to it, for the purpose of carrying out the 
trust established by its donors and founders. 

On October 24, 1842, another decree was made by the same 
authority, reciting the inconvenience and waste and expense 
attending the management of the various properties belonging 
to the "Pious Fund," through the medium of public officers, 
and thereupon directing that the property belonging to it 
should be sold for the sum represented by its income (capital- 
ized on the basis of six per cent, per annum), that the proceeds 
of the sale as well as the cash investments of the fund should 
be paid into the public treasury, and recognized an obligation 
on the part of the government to pay six per cent, per annum 
•on the capital thereof thenceforth. 

The property of the "Pious Fund" at the time of that decree 



APPENDIX 335 

of October 24, 1842, consisted of real estate, urban and rural ; 
moneys invested on mortgage and other security, and the like. 
The greater part of the property was sold, in pursuance of the 
last mentioned decree, for a sum of about two millions of 
dollars. The names of the purchasers are stated by Mr. Duflot 
de Mofras, in his "Exploration du Territoire de I'Oregon et de 
la Calif ornie," to have been the house of Saraio and Messrs. 
Rubio Bros. ; but notwithstanding the solicitude for the welfare 
of the Church and the advancement of the missionary cause so 
clearly expressed by the President, in the recital of motives, 
etc., which precedes his decree, such was the disposition to 
detraction then prevalent in the Mexican metropolis, that there 
were not wanting people mean and jealous enough to insinuate 
that the President himself had what is popularly called an 
underground interest in the purchase. 

Besides the property, real and personal, belonging to the 
fund, it was a creditor to the State in amounts aggregating 
over a million and a quarter of dollars. For with all their 
enormous wealth, the Spanish monarchs were from time to time 
excessively impecunious, and the power to use trust funds 
without immediate accountability sometimes led them, as it 
has led many another man before and since, to misappropria- 
tion; and so they occasionally would put their hands into the 
treasury of the "Pious Fund" and abstract some of the cash. 
"How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds, makes deeds ill 
done." Such, however, is the punctiliousness of the Castilian 
character, that for whatever sums he borrowed, the king always 
insisted, like Micawber, on giving his note of hand. I have a 
memorandum of the dates and amounts of these, but they are 
not really interesting. Mexico having become independent of 
Spain, with a sense of honor creditable to the men who then 
controlled her destiny, made haste to recognize her obligation 
for so much of the public debt of Spain as belonged to the 
Viceroyalty, and in the treaty of peace between the mother 
country and the emancipated colony, concluded December 29, 
1836, this acknowledgment — already solemnly pronounced by 
the law of June 28, 1824 — was formally repeated. 



336 CALIFORNIA 

Perhaps it wiU surprise many to learn that the payment of 
the interest on the capital of the fund was not always punc- 
tually made by the government of Mexico. In fact, it was 
sadly neglected, and although on a very few occasions some 
small payments were made on account — by orders on the Cus- 
tom House, sometimes even countermanded before they took 
effect — yet these were so insignificant as to become what the 
mathematician terms a negligable quantity. Mexico, how- 
ever, like Spain, always insisted on honestly giving her note 
for what she borrowed; it is charitable, therefore, to assume 
that her poverty, and not her will, consented to its non-pay- 
ment. 

At the time of the seizure of the "Pious Fund" by Santa Ana, 
the agent and attorney in fact of Bishop Diego, in the City of 
Mexico, was a venerable old gentleman called Don Pedro 
Ramirez. His probity of character, blameless life, and vener- 
able years, commanded the respect of even the rough soldiers 
whom Santa Ana made use of in his violations of the laws of 
the country. From what I have been able to learn of him, I 
judge that even Marshall St. Arnaux or Bazaine himself would 
have felt constrained to treat him with deference. He was a 
man of method, too, and a careful manager. During the brief 
period of his stewardship, he succeeded in terminating most of 
the varied litigations in which the "junta directiva" had in- 
volved the fund, had paid off its floating debt, cancelled un- 
profitable leases, and otherwise had made the property produc- 
tive. When General Valencia (Santa Ana's officer), informed 
him of his orders to seize the fund, and rescue it from the evils 
of this sort of private administration, the old gentleman thought 
it his duty to protest, however vainly, against the proceeding. 
He did protest and had quite a lively correspondence with 
General Valencia. The latter, however, was more of a soldier 
perhaps than a diplomatist, and presently threatened, after the 
manner of Brennus, to throw this sword and belt into the scale. 
Don Pedro, however, stood firm for a recognition, at least of his 
position, and insisted on delivering the property according to an 
inventory of "Instruccion Circumstanciada, " in which the 



APPENDIX 337 

exact state of the fund, the properties, the rents, mortgage 
investment, etc., were all set out, and in deference to his age 
and character, and I think I may add, to his pluck, the General 
consented and the delivery was so made. The ship was sinking, 
but the old apoderado, like the heroic victims of the Birkenhead 
disaster, was determined to maintain his honor to the last and 
go down with ranks dressed, and to the word "Attention." He 
drew up his "Instruccion Circumstanciada" in duplicate, deliv- 
ered one copy duly authenticated by himself to General Valen- 
cia, and transmitted the other to his principal, with a copy of 
his correspondence preceding the final surrender, and thus the 
capital of the "Pious Fund," after about one hundred and sixty 
years of separate existence, was engulfed in the maelstrom of 
the Mexican Treasury. 

The fund had so long ceased to yield any substantial support 
to the missionaries that its final absorption made no appreciable 
change in their circumstances or in the resources of the Mis- 
sions. The younger men had known nothing of it, and the elder 
ones remembered it only in connection with the "good old 
times" when things were better managed than they are now. 
Its origin was lost in antiquity, no papers existed in the Mission 
archives relating to it, and it came ere long to be practically 
forgotten. 

When the California State Government was formed, there 
was a tradition in the country that such an institution as the 
"Pious Fund" once existed, and that Santa Ana had abolished 
or confiscated it ; that was about all. In 1851, the State Legis- 
lature appointed a committee of enquiry on the subject, which 
examined all the old inhabitants as to what they knew of it, 
but was in the end compelled to report that all they could 
discover was that there had been such a fund, and that it 
amounted to a very large sum, but as to where it came from, 
how it arose, what it was, or what became of it, they could 
discover nothing. It was ' ' one of those things no fellow could 
find out." 

In 1853, Archbishop Alemany, then Bishop of Monterey and 
successor to Bishop Diego, brought me a small package of 



338 CALIFORNIA 

papers, which he had found in the archives of his predecessor 
in office, saying that they related to the "Pious Fund," and he 
desired me to look them over and see whether he had not some 
claim against either Mexico or the United States, for indemnity 
or compensation by reason of Santa Ana's acts of 1842. I read 
them over and amongst them found the "Instruccion Circum- 
stanciada" of Don Pedro Ramirez, a copy of Santa Ana's 
decree and some other scraps, which gave me some idea of the 
matter, not very clear, but sufficient to build on. Subsequently 
in 1857, the Bishop renewed the subject, and retained me in 
conjunction with another gentleman, now deceased, to endeavor 
to obtain for the Church whatever she was entitled to in this 
connection. Thenceforth I began to read Mexican and Cali- 
fornian history to see how much could be discovered in printed 
publications about the "Pious Fund." And here Don Pedro 
Ramirez's methodical discharge of duty proved of incalculable 
value to me. His "Instruccion Circumstanciada" named each 
piece of property, urban or rural, which he delivered over. 
Among them were the haciendas of "Guadaloupe" and "Arroyo 
Sarco, " the purchase of which I found mentioned in Venegas 
as far back as 1716, and those of "San Pedro Ibarra," "El 
Torreon" and "Las Golondrinas, " which are named in the 
Marquis de Villa Puente's deed. These names enabled me to 
identify the property and trace its acquisition. The labor of 
investigation soon became itself a pleasure, and, in the succeed- 
ing ten or eleven years, I picked up — a scrap here and another 
there — the material of the history I have here recounted. I 
had not indeed any sanguine hope of ever establishing any claim 
for the Bishop, but, if opportunity ever presented, I was pre- 
pared to open my case upon very short notice, and in the 
meantime I had had a deal of pleasure in making the prepara- 
tion. I had renewed my acquaintance with Cortes, Alvarado 
and Sandoval; become intimate with Mendoza, Bucarelli, 
Revilla-Gigedo and Galvez, got acquainted with Fathers Salva- 
tierra, Ugarte, Kino, Serra, Palou, Verger and Crespi, and 
altogether had succeeded in introducing myself to a most agree- 
able circle of society, concerning which my only regret was 



APPENDIX 339 

that so few of my contemporary friends knew them or appre- 
ciated their worth. The professional interest which first led 
me to take up the study gradually faded away, and the his- 
torical interest became broader. The Bishop ceased to cherish, 
and finally dismissed from his mind the hope of recovering 
anything on account of the ''Pious Fund"; my associate coun- 
sel, absorbed in other affairs, public and private, forgot all 
about our retainer, and I had ceased, myself, to think of the 
case in connection with any legal proceedings. 

On Sunday, March 28, 1870, I casually took up a New York 
paper and my eyes fell on a paragraph stating that "Wednes- 
day, the 31st instant, would be the last day for presenting 
claims to the Mixed American and Mexican Commission then 
sitting in Washington." I was away from the city at the 
moment, and no conveyance could be obtained before the next 
day. The "Pious Fund" as a case in my charge had so long 
appeared a hopeless one, that I had not even noticed that a 
claims convention had been agreed on between the two govern- 
ments. I hurried to the city next morning, soon got hold of 
the convention of July 4, 1869, and read it. Demands under it 
were limited to injuries to persons or property committed by 
either Kepublic on the citizens of the other, since the date of 
the treaty of Guadaloupe Hidalgo, February 22, 1848. It was 
clear that the wrong done in seizing the "Pious Fund" and 
taking it into the public treasury in 1842, could not be made 
the subject of reclamation under the convention. I read it 
again, with the mental inquiry, "Is there no way to bring our 
claim under this treaty?" 

The time for deliberation was very short. My client was 
away in Europe; his Vicar General knew nothing whatever of 
the matter. My associate was in Washington evidently oblivi- 
ous of the whole affair ; there was nothing but to decide on my 
own responsibility and act at once. I determined to waive all 
claim for the property of the fund, treat Santa Ana's decree 
as a bona fide purchase of it, at the price and in the terms indi- 
cated in its text, and demand damages for the non-fulfilment of 
the contract by the payment of the installments of interest 



340 CALIFORNIA 

accrued since the treaty of Guadaloupe Hidalgo. I sent a tele- 
gram to Washington outlining the claim, and desiring it to be 
filed with the commission, and by the following Wednesday 
had the satisfaction of learning that my message had been 
received and the claim seasonably presented. 

The details of the litigation would have only a professional 
interest and I omit them. The case was defended, at first by 
the late Caleb Gushing, and after his appointment to the Span- 
ish Mission, by Don Manuel Aspiros, a gentleman whose histori- 
cal and professional attainments it would be difficult to find a 
rival for. The two commissioners differed in opinion, and the 
case being referred to Sir Edward Thornton, then British 
Ambassador in Washington, as umpire, he gave me an award 
for the half of the accrued interest belonging to Upper Cali- 
fornia, amounting to the sum of $904,070.79. 

The above concludes Mr. Doyle's excellent and authentic 
statement of the celebrated case. But there is more to follow. 
Mexico paid the first installment January 31, 1877; the second, 
January 31, 1878, and the last January 21, 1890. And the 
Holy See apportioned the award among the dioceses and 
religious orders. 

Archbishop Riordan of San Francisco — successor to Arch- 
bishop Alemany — within a month and a half from the last- 
mentioned date, invoked, through his counsel, the diplomatic 
intervention of the United States Government to secure the 
payment of the interest from 1869, the fact of the debt and the 
trust having been established by the decision of Sir Edward 
Thornton. The representations of the United States Minister 
to Mexico were ignored for six years, until the letter of General 
Clayton, Minister to Mexico, dated September 1, 1897, brought 
an answer from the Mexican Minister of Foreign Affairs. In 
that letter the American Minister distinctly styled the matter 
res judicata, that is, decided once for all by the former arbitral 
court. The prolonged diplomatic correspondence ensuing 
therefrom resulted in the protocol of May 22, 1902, signed by 
John Hay, United States Secretary of State, and Senor de 



APPENDIX 341 

Aspiros, Mexican Ambassador at Washington, by which the 
entire matter was submitted to the Permanent Court of Arbi- 
tration under the Hague Convention of 1899. 

The United States chose as her arbitrators Sir Edward Fry 
of England and Professor Theodore de Martens of Russia. 
Mexico appointed Mr, Alexander Lohman of Holland and Sen- 
ator Guarnaschelli of Italy, but the latter resigning on account 
of his son's death, Professor Asser of Holland was chosen in his 
stead. These four settled on Mr. Matzer, President of the 
Danish Chamber of Deputies, as the fifth member of the Board, 
of whom not a single individual was a Catholic. September 
13, 1902, the case was formally opened, and October 13, 1902, a 
unanimous decision was rendered in favor of the Church. 
Mexico was condemned to pay $1,460,682 in Mexican currency 
within eight months as the interest due up to February 2, 1902. 
Moreover, to use the very words of the award : * ' Mexico will 

pay February 2, 1903, and every following year on 

the same date forever, annual payment of $43,050 of the money 
of the legal currency of Mexico." The decision did not com- 
pel Mexico to pay in gold. The first payment was made June 
16, 1903. 

The whole question, in a nutshell, was admirably stated by 
Garret McEnerney in his argument before The Hague Tribunal, 
as f oUows : 

"When Mexico made her decree of October 24, 1842, she 
promised to pay six per cent, upon the capital of the Pious Fund 
for the uses and purposes to which the fund had been dedicated 
by the donors. This engagement was no mere gratuity. There 
was not only a sufficient but an ample consideration for the 
promise. She incorporated the entire Pious Fund into her 
national treasury. The least she could do in honor was to 
promise to pay interest upon the fund. Mexico not only agreed 
to pay the interest, but she agreed to pay it to the religious 
objects specified and intended by the donors of the fund, which 
were the conversion of the natives of the Californias, Upper 
and Lower, and the establishment, maintenance and extension 
of the Catholic Church, its religion and worship in that country. 



342 CALIFORNIA 

"At the time she made the engagement Mexico sustained the 
relation of a trustee to the beneficiaries and to the fund. . . . 
Her promise, therefore, is to be read in the light of her duty as 
trustee. The promise which Mexico made was to pay an annuity 
in perpetuity. Her promise was also to pay it to certain reli- 
gious purposes to be accomplished in Upper California, and cer- 
tain religious purposes to be accomplished in Lower California. 
Upon the cession of Upper California to the United States for a 
consideration of $18,250,000, the obligation to pay the equitable 
portion due for application to the religious purposes to be ac- 
complished in Upper California was not canceled. It survived 
for the benefit and behoof of the inhabitants and citizens of the 
ceded territory, whose American citizenship, as it was to be 
thenceforth, entitled them to demand performance through the 
interposition of the United States." 



FREMONT'S FAMOUS RIDE 

The following narrative, vouched for by John Bigelow, Fre- 
mont's eminent biographer, was published in the National 
Intelligencer, Washington, D. C, Nov. 22, 1847. The jour- 
ney was undertaken by Colonel Fremont to inform General 
Kearney of the outbreak of an insurrection at Los Angeles. 
It ranks among the most remarkable "rides" recorded m 
history : 

"This extraordinary ride of 800 miles in eight days, includ- 
ing all stoppages and near two days' detention — a whole day 
and a night at Monterey, and nearly two half days at San Luis 
Obispo — having been brought into evidence before the army 
court martial now in session in this city, and great desire being 
expressed by some friends to know how the ride was made, I 
herewith send you the particulars, that you may publish them 
if you please, in the National Intelligencer as an incident con- 
nected with the times and affairs under review in the trial, of 
which you give so full a report. The circumstances were first 
got from Jacob, afterwards revised by Colonel Fremont, and I 
drew them up from his statement. 

"The publication will show, besides the horsemanship of the 
riders, the power of the California horse, especially as one of 
the horses was subjected, in the course of the ride, to an extra- 
ordinary trial in order to exhibit the capacity of his race. Of 
course this statement will make no allusion to the objects of the 
journey, but be confined strictly to its performance. 

"It was at daybreak on the morning of the 22nd of March, 
1846, that the party set out from La Ciudad de Los Angeles (the 
City of the Angels) in the southern part of Upper California, to 
proceed, in the shortest time, to Monterey on the Pacific coast, 
distant full four hundred miles. The way is over a mountainous 
country, much of it uninhabited, with no other road than a 



344 CALIFORNIA 

trace, and many defiles to pass, particularly the maritime defile 
of el Rincon or Pimto Gordo, fifteen miles in extent, made by 
the jutting of a precipitous mountain into the sea, and which 
can only be passed when the tide is out and the sea calm, and 
then in many places through the waves. The towns of Santa 
Barbara and San Luis Obispo, and occasional ranches, are the 
principal inhabited places on the route. Each of the party had 
three horses, nine in all, to take their turns under the saddle. 
The six loose horses ran ahead, without bridle or halter, and 
required some attention to keep to the track. When wanted 
for a change, say at the distance of twenty miles, they were 
caught by the lasso, thrown either by Don Jesus or the servant 
Jacob, who, though born in Washington, in his long expeditions 
with Colonel Fremont, had become as expert as a Mexican with 
the lasso, as sure as the mountaineer with the rifle, equal to 
either on horse or foot, and always a lad of courage and fidelity. 

"None of the horses were shod, that being a practice unknown 
to the Californians. The most usual gait was a sweeping gallop. 
The first day they ran one hundred and twenty-five miles, pass- 
ing the San Fernando mountain, the defile of the Rincon, several 
other mountains, and slept at the hospitable rancho of Don 
Thormas Robberis, beyond the town of Santa Barbara. The 
only fatigue complained of in this day's ride was in Jacob's 
right arm, made tired by throwing the lasso, and using it as a 
whip to keep the loose horses to the track. 

''The next day they made another one hundred and twenty- 
five miles, passing the formidable mountain of Santa Barbara, 
and counting upon it the skeletons of some fifty horses, part of 
near double that number which perished in the crossing of that 
terrible mountain by the California battalion, on Christmas 
day, 1846, amidst a raging tempest, and a deluge of rain and 
cold more killing than that of the Sierra Nevada — the day of 
severest suffering, say Fremont and his men, that they have 
ever passed. At sunset, the party stopped to sup with the 
friendly Captain Dana, and at nine at night San Luis Obispo 
was reached, the home of Don Jesus, and where an affecting 
reception awaited Lieutenant-Colonel Fremont, in consequence 



APPENDIX 345 

of an incident which occurred there that history will one day- 
record; and he was detained till 10 o'clock in the morning 
receiving the visits of the inhabitants (mothers and children 
included), taking a breakfast of honor, and waiting for a 
relief of fresh horses to be brought in from the surrounding 
country. Here the nine horses brought from Los Angeles 
were left, and eight others taken in their place, and a Spanish 
boy added to the party to assist in managing the loose horses. 
"Proceeding at the usual gait till eight at night, and having 
made some seventy miles, Don Jesus, who had spent the night 
before with his family and friends, and probably with but little 
sleep, became fatigued, and proposed a halt for a few hours. 
It was in the valley of the Salinas (salt river called Buena 
Ventura in the old maps), and the haunt of marauding Indians. 
For safety during their repose, the party turned off the trace, 
issued through a canyon into a thick wood, and laid down, the 
horses being put to grass at a short distance, with the Spanish 
boy in the saddle to watch. Sleep, when commenced, was too 
sweet to be easily given up, and it was half way between mid- 
night and day when the sleepers were aroused by an estampede 
among the horses, and the calls of the boy. The cause of the 
alarm was soon found, not Indians, but white bears — this valley 
being their great resort, and the place where Colonel Fremont 
and thirty-five of his men encountered some hundred of them 
the summer before, killing thirty upon the ground. 

"The character of these bears is well known, and the bravest 
hunters do not like to meet them without the advantage of 
numbers. On discovering the enemy. Colonel Fremont felt for 
his pistols, but Don Jesus desired him to lie still, saying that 
'people could scare bears'; and immediately hallooed at them 
in Spanish, and they went off. Sleep went off also; and the 
recovery of the horses frightened by the bears, building a rous- 
ing fire, making a breakfast from the hospitable supplies of 
San Luis Obispo, occupied the party till daybreak, when the 
journey was resumed eighty miles, and the afternoon brought 
the party to Monterey. 

"The next day, in the afternoon, the party set out on their 



346 CALIFORNIA 

return, and the two horses rode by Colonel Fremont from San 
Luis Obispo, being a present to him from Don Jesus, he (Don 
Jesus) desired to make an experiment of what one of them 
could do. They were brothers, one a grass younger than the 
other, both of the same color (cinnamon) and hence called el 
canalo, or los canalos (the cinnamon or the cinnamons). The 
elder was to be taken for the trial; and the journey commenced 
upon him at leaving Monterey, the afternoon well advanced. 
Thirty miles under the saddle done that evening, and the party 
stopped for the night. In the morning the elder canalo was 
again under the saddle for Colonel Fremont, and for ninety 
miles he carried him without a change, and without apparent 
fatigue. It was stiU thirty miles to San Luis Obispo, where 
the night was to be passed, and Don Jesus insisted that canalo 
could do it, and so said the horse by his looks and action. But 
Colonel Fremont would not put him to the trial, and, shifting 
the saddle to the younger brother, the elder was turned loose 
to run the remaining thirty miles without a rider. He did so, 
immediately taking the lead and keeping it all the way, and 
entering San Luis in a sweeping gallop, nostrils distended, 
snuffing the air, and neighing with exultation at his return to 
his native pastures ; his younger brother all the time at the head 
of the horses imder the saddle, bearing on his bit, and held in 
by his rider. The whole eight horses made their one hundred 
and twenty miles each that day (after thirty the evening be- 
fore), the elder cinnamon making ninety of his under the saddle 
that day, besides thirty under the saddle the evening before; 
nor was there the least doubt that he would have done the whole 
distance in the same time if he had continued under the saddle. 

"After a hospitable detention of another half a day at San 
Luis Obispo, the party set out for Los Angeles on the same nine 
horses which they had ridden from that place, and made the 
ride back in about the same time they had made it up, namely, 
at the rate of one hundred and twenty-five miles a day. 

"On this ride, the grass on the road was the food for the 
horses. At Monterey they had barley ; but these horses, mean- 
ing those trained and domesticated, as the canalos were, eat 



APPENDIX 347 

almost anything of vegetable food, or even drink, that their 
master uses, by whom they are petted and caressed, and rarely 
sold. Bread, fruit, sugar, coffee, and even wine (like the Per- 
sian horses), they take from the hand of their master, and obey 
with like docility his slightest intimation. A tap of the whip 
on the saddle springs them into action ; the check of a thread 
rein (on the Spanish bit) would stop them; and stopping short 
at speed they do not jostle the rider or throw him forward. 
They leap on anything — man, beast, or weapon, on which their 
master directs them. But this description, so far as conduct 
and behavior are concerned, of course only applies to the trained 
and domesticated horse." 

While on the subject of California horses and the horseman- 
ship of the Californians, the following reference to those sub- 
jects, quoted from the works of Hubert Howe Bancroft, are 
interesting : 

"Speaking of the splendid riding, Sepulveda says that the 
few who were not good riders were looked upon with a sort of 
contempt. Their attachment to their steeds was as great as 
the Arab's, and the greatest token of friendship between man 
and man was the present of their best horse. 

"The Californians always galloped, says Gomez, never rein- 
ing in to smoke. When the horse tired, the traveler would catch 
the first other one he saw, and so continue changing his steed, 
always sure of recovering it on returning. The hat was small 
at the opening and a string was put on to secure it. The rider 
usually had his mouth open as if to keep the hat-string tight, 
and the hat secure; often as he rode along he filled the air 
with popular ditties. If rain overtook the horseman, he would 
ride into the first house he came to, if there were no outhouses 
or sheds. 

"The story goes that a horseman of San Jose won a wager 
that he could start at full gallop with a salver of a dozen wine 
glasses filled to the brim, and after fifty rods stop suddenly 
and hand down the salver without having spilled a drop. 

"In horsemanship, the Californians compared favorably with 
the sturdy Chilians and the flimsily attired and almost effemi- 



S48 CALIFORNIA 

nate Peruvian. Both the Calif ornian man and horse were supe- 
rior to the Mexican in strength and weight, and by the different 
arrangement of the saddle-gear — the girth exactly in the center, 
and stirrup forward, almost an appendage from the pommel — 
his figure erect and well poised. The Gaucho of the pampas 
perhaps might excel him in some of the light exercises ; but for 
hard work, strength and agility, the Californian stood un- 
rivaled. 

''Serrano remarks that when Californian women rode on 
horseback they used the same trappings and saddles as men, 
though without ornaments; some are exceedingly skillful in 
managing a horse, mounting alone and with agility. As the 
saddles on which they ride have the saddle-bow and stirrups 
taken off, they used as a stirrup for one foot a silk band, one 
end made fast at the pommel, the other at the cantle. When 
the lady was not a skillful rider and afraid, the cabaUero seated 
her on the saddle, took off his spurs, mounted on the crupper, 
and taking the reins guided the horse." 



JUNIPERO SERRA'S MOST FAMOUS WALK 

One thing that cannot fail to strike the reader of California 's 
history is the fact that Father Junipero Serra, the great founder 
and first President of the Missions, was a most extraordinary 
pedestrian. He followed literally the Franciscan tradition that 
a friar of his Order should never ride when he could possibly 
walk, no matter how arduous the journey. 

The chronicles of the Mission days show that Father Junipero 
walked many times from Monterey to San Diego and back 
again, as he went about founding new Missions or visiting offi- 
cially those that had been already founded. His performances 
are the more remarkable because of the chronic sore on his leg 
Mnth which he was afflicted — an old wound received in Mexico 
and which rendered him at most times lame, besides giving him 
almost constant pain. 

There can be no doubt that this wonderful old Franciscan 
covered more miles of California ground afoot than any other 
person who has ever lived upon that soil. In the first place, he 
came to California on foot from Old Mexico from which country 
he arrived at San Diego, July 1, 1769. But he made a still more 
famous journey back to Old Mexico and return in 1772-3, when 
he walked a distance that aggregated at least 2400 miles. His 
route lay for many days over quite trackless deserts among 
wild beasts and savage men. His only companion was a Chris- 
tian Indian of Monterey. Both were stricken with fever at 
Guadalajara, but recovered. It were hard to find a man to 
attempt the same journey today, when civilization and com- 
merce have marked the trails and the water holes of the brown 
Southwest, whose trails are dim with death. 

A simple yet eloquent account of this famous journey has 
been given us by Father Zephyrin Engelhardt, a Franciscan 
friar of Santa Barbara, whose monumental historical work 
must remain the standard authority regarding the Missions of 



350 CALIFORNIA 

California. Father Zephyrin's account is in part herewith 
reproduced, not only for its accuracy as concerns the journey 
itself, but also for the information it affords as to the purposes 
for which the journey was undertaken and the results that were 
attained : 

"Fr. Serra now urged Fages (the Comandante) to proceed 
with the establishment of Mission Buenaventura on the Santa 
Barbara channel, as originally planned by Don Galvez five years 
before. He spoke to Fages, says Palou, about an escort and 
other assistance necessary to start the Mission, but found the 
door closed and Fages giving directions whose execution 
threatened to bring about the loss of what had cost so much 
work to accomplish. To prevent such a result, the venerable 
Father used every means suggested by his prudence and skill j 
but in no way was he able to accomplish his purpose. 

"Only a few months before, March 18, 1772, the viceroy had 
urged Fages to maintain harmony, to treat converts well, and 
to promote mission work in every way possible. Now, how- 
ever, the captain presented so many objections to the founding 
of San Buenaventura and similar establishments, that Fr. Serra 
began to suspect that orders must have eminated from higher 
authority prohibiting these undertakings for the future. He 
therefore consulted with the Fathers about the matter. It was 
the opinion of the four missionaries, Serra and Paterna of San 
Gabriel, Somera and Pena of San Diego, that Fr. Junipero, or 
someone selected by him, should proceed to Mexico, and repre- 
sent to the viceroy the great needs of the Missions, and give 
correct information regarding the state of things in California. 
To obtain God's assistance for the success of this journey, a 
solemn High Mass was offered up on the following day, October 
13th, after which the three Fathers concluded that the only 
suitable person to transact a business of such importance was 
the Fr. Superior himself. Though in his sixtieth year and 
lame, the zealous Father agreed to make the long journey of 
200 leagues by land, besides the voyage by sea, in order to 
secure the welfare of his Indian neophytes. During his absence 
Fr. Paterna acted as superior of the Missions. 



APPENDIX 351 

"Fr. Junipero embarked on the San Carlos at San Diego on 
October 20th, and after a prosperous voyage arrived at San 
Bias, November 4th, in company with an Indian Christian from 
Monterey, who afterwards was confirmed by Archbishop Loren- 
zana. At San Bias Fr. Serra heard of the transfer of the Lower 
California Missions to the Dominicans. Learning that the Fr. 
Guardian had left Fr. Palou free to retire to Mexico or to go 
to Upper California, Fr. Junipero at once wrote to him from 
Tepie on November 10th: 'If your Keverence is determined 
that we shall live and die in California, it will be to me a great 
consolation. I only say, act according to God's will. ... If 
the Fr. Guardian should order that only four go there, and that 
the others should return to the college, I have nothing to say, 
but I pray God may apply a remedy. Meanwhile let us obey. ' 

"Meanwhile Fr. Serra had proceeded on his way to the capi- 
tal as far as Guadalajara, where both he and his neophyte 
companion fell sick with fever. They were reduced to the last 
extremity and received the sacraments of the dying. For him- 
self Fr. Junipero was resigned, but in regard to the neophyte 
he feared lest the death of the Indian youth might retard the 
conversion of the other natives, as they might imagine that the 
Christians had killed him. Almighty God, however, allowed 
both to recover and reach Mexico on February 6, 1773. 

"Fr. Junipero found the new viceroy, Antonio Bucareli, no 
less favorably disposed toward the Missions than his prede- 
cessor, De la Croix. At the request of the viceroy he prepared 
a memorial on the state of the Missions in California, and pre- 
sented the document to the government on the 15th of March. 
'In this statement,' said he to the viceroy when presenting the 
papers, 'you will find that I have said nothing but what is true, 
and what in conscience I was bound to say, and what I consider 
absolutely necessary to obtain that which his royal Majesty 
so much desires, namely, the conversion of souls who, for want 
of knowledge of our holy faith, remain in the slavery of the 
devil, but who by these means can easily be redeemed. I trust 
your excellency will speedily determine what is just and expe- 
dient, since I must return as soon as possible, whether or not I 



352 CALIFORNIA 

obtain what I ask, rejoicing if it be granted, and somewhat 
grieved, but resigned to the will of God if it be refused.' 

"The statement consisted of thirty-two articles. The first 
and second point concerned the port of San Bias. Therein he 
strenuously urged the necessity of keeping that port open to 
furnish the Missions with the necessary supplies. It had been 
decided to close San Bias, and to send supplies by land. Fr. 
Serra's arguments proved unanswerable, and his request was 
granted. The remaining articles were submitted by the vice- 
roy to the 'Junta de guerra y real hacienda,' board of war and 
royal exchequer, of which Bucareli was a member. This body 
on May 6th granted eighteen of them and part of another, and 
denied only a part of article 32, in which Fr. Serra asked to 
have the expenses of his journey to Mexico refunded. Thus 
twenty of the original points were disposed of entirely in his 
favor. Four of these bore upon the past troubles between the 
Franciscans and the military authorities, and were intended 
to curtail the powers which had been assumed by the latter. 
Fr. Serra made specific charges against Comandante Fages, 
among which were these: His refusal to transfer soldiers for 
bad conduct at the request of the missionary; meddling with 
the management of the Missions and the punishment of neo- 
phytes, as he had no right to do except for grave offences; 
irregular and delayed delivery of letters and property directed 
to the missionaries; insolence and constant efforts to annoy 
the Fathers who were at his mercy ; opening of letters addressed 
to the missionaries, and neglect to inform them when mails 
were to start; taking away the Mission mules for the use of 
the soldiers ; and retention of cattle intended for new Missions. 

"By the decision of the Junta the comandante was ordered 
to remove any soldier of irregular conduct and bad example 
from the Mission guard to the presidio, at the missionary's 
request; the missionaries were allowed to manage the Mission 
Indians as a father would his family, and the military com- 
mander was instructed to preserve perfect harmony with the 
Fathers ; property and letters for them or their Missions were 
to be forwarded in separate packages, and their correspondence 



APPENDIX 353 

was not to be meddled with, but to pass free of charge like that 
of the soldiers ; additional vestments and seven bells were to be 
furnished ; two blacksmiths and two carpenters, with tools and 
material, were to be sent from Guadalajara for the exclusive 
use of the Missions, etc. Comandante Fages was subsequently 
relieved of his position and replaced by Rivera y Moncada. A 
set of new regulations provided for several points in Fr. Serra's 
petition pertaining to the military and financial affairs of 
California. * ' 

The journey was a great triumph for Junipero Serra and the 
cause which was so dear to his heart. He returned rejoiced 
and strengthened in heart and mind to prosecute with renewed 
vigor the work of the Missions. The physical endurance which 
he displayed in faring so far amid so many dangers, and the 
splendid courage of his soul in facing a task so supreme, was 
not without effect at the time and stands to this day as a thrill- 
ing memory in the annals of California. 

In the report which was forwarded to Mexico by Father 
Junipero 's instructions immediately preceding his return to 
Monterey, Father Palou showed what the Franciscans had ac- 
complished during the initial years of their labors in Upper 
California. 

It appeared from this report that in the four years following 
the arrival of the missionaries at San Diego in 1769, five Mis- 
sions had been founded. These were: San Diego de Alcala, 
San Carlos Borromeo, San Antonio de Padua, San Gabriel 
Arcangel and San Luis Obispo de Tolosa. 

"Thus," says Engelhardt, "there were, in the latter part of 
1773, nineteen Franciscan Fathers engaged in missionary work 
among the Indians of California. Four hundred and ninety-one 
natives had been baptized, of whom twenty-nine had died, and 
sixty-two Indian couples had been united in Christian marriage. 

"With regard to the Mission buildings, Father Serra reported 
that at every Mission a line of high, strong posts, set in the 
ground close together, enclosed a rectangular space, which con- 
tained simple wooden structures, serving as church and dwell- 



354 CALIFORNIA 

ings; the walls of these also generally took the stockade form. 
The square at San Carlos was seventy yards long and forty- 
three yards wide, with ravelins at the corners. . . . The sol- 
diers* quarters were apart from the Mission buildings and en- 
closed by a separate stockade, while outside of both enclosures 
were the huts of Indians. Adobes were used to some extent in 
constructing a few buildings at San Diego. At San Antonio 
the church and convent were built of adobe. Some of the build- 
ings at Monterey were also constructed of adobe. ... In agri- 
culture only slight progress had been made so far, though by 
repeated failures the missionaries were gaining experience for 
future success." 



THE GREAT SEAL OF THE STATE 

The following official statement has been published under 
authority of an Act of the State Legislature of California : 

At the time when the question of designing the great seal 
for the new State was being agitated in the Constitutional 
Convention which met in Monterey in 1849, there happened to 
be sojourning temporarily in that little town an accomplished 
and cultivated officer of the United States Army, Major Robert 
Selden Garnett. He was a gentleman of modest demeanor, and 
excelled in the use of his pencil. One evening he sketched a 
design for a seal of the State, and it was exhibited to various 
members of the Convention. One of the delegates asked leave 
to present it to the body, but the quiet Major declined, upon the 
ground that he believed that a knowledge of the source whence 
it had come would prevent its adoption. There existed at that 
time quite a hostility between the military authorities and the 
nascent civil powers, and there was an especial distrust of the 
secret mission of Thomas Butler King, with which Garnett was 
understood to be connected. Caleb Lyon, one of the clerks of 
the convention, learned of the design, and readily obtained the 
consent of Garnett to appropriate it and present it as his own 
production. As the design came from the hands of its author, 
it was chaste and beautiful, and somewhat different from the 
present seal. It represented the figure of Minerva, with the 
Golden Gate, and a ship in full sail in the foreground, and 
the Sierra Nevada range in the background, with the word 
"Eureka" above. The design was referred to a committee, 
and on September 29, 1849, the report of the committee was 
considered by the convention. W. E. Shannon deemed the 
design a most happy one, but more appropriate for a coat of 
arms than for a seal. He said that it was unusual for a State 
seal to contain a motto, and that it ordinarily comprehended 
the main emblems, and the words "Great Seal of the State." 

-M.. 



356 CALIFORNIA 

An explanation accompanying the design was entered in the 
Journal, as follows : 

"Around the bend of the ring are represented thirty-one 
stars, being the number of States of which the Union will con- 
sist upon the admission of California. The foreground figure 
represents the Goddess Minerva, having sprung full grown 
from the brain of Jupiter. She is introduced as a type of the 
political birth of the State of California, without having gone 
through the probation of a territory. At her feet crouches a 
grizzly bear feeding upon the clusters from a grapevine, em- 
blematic of the peculiar characteristics of the country. A miner 
is engaged with his rocker and bowl at his side, illustrating the 
golden wealth of the Sacramento, upon whose waters are seen 
shipping, typical of commercial greatness; and the snowclad 
peaks of the Sierra Nevada make up the background, while 
above is the Greek motto "Eureka" (I have found it), applying 
either to the principle involved in the admission of the State, or 
the success of the miner at work." 

After various amendments had been suggested, the matter 
was laid on the table. On October 2nd the report of the com- 
mittee was again considered. Rodman M. Price submitted a 
resolution that the design for the seal reported by the com- 
mittee be accepted. 0. M. Wozencraft submitted the follow- 
ing, which was rejected: "That the seal be amended by 
striking out the figures of the gold-digger and the bear and 
introducing instead bags of gold and bales of merchandise." 
M. G. Vallejo submitted an amendment that the bear be taken 
out of the design ; or, if it do remain, that it be represented as 
made fast by a lasso in the hands of a vaquero. 

After the debate, the amendment proposed by Vallejo was 
rejected by a vote of sixteen to twenty-one. Price's resolution 
was then adopted. W. S. Sherwood moved that the seal be the 
"coat of arms" of the State of California, and the motion was 
then carried by a vote of twenty-one to sixteen. Price then 
submitted a resolution that Lyon be authorized to superintend 
the engraving of the seal; that he furnish the same, in the 
shortest possible time, to the Secretary of the Convention, with 



APPENDIX 357 

a press and all necessary appendages, and that the sum of 
$1000 be advanced to him in full compensation for the design 
and seal. This resolution was not considered until the 11th, 
when a substitute was adopted, authorizing Lyon to superin- 
tend the engraving and to furnish the seal as soon as possible 
to the Secretary of the Convention, to be delivered to the Sec- 
retary of State under the Constitution : and the sum of $1000 
was to be paid, in full compensation for the design, seal, press, 
and all appendages. It was also resolved that the words "The 
Great Seal of the State of California" be added to the design. 
Henry W. Halleck inquired if any gentleman present knew 
what had become of the original design, and said the gentleman 
by whom it was designed (Major Garnett) requested that it 
should be found if possible and handed to the gentleman who 
occupied the chair. Mr. Sherwood said that he believed the 
seal was not the entire production of the gentleman who had 
been authorized to have it engraved, and that Lyon did not 
claim it as such. He said that the original design had been 
given to Lyon by a gentleman who did not wish his name to be 
made public, but expressed a desire, in a confidential letter to 
Lyon, that he (Lyon) might be known as the author. 

The bear was added chiefly to gratify Major J. R. Snyder 
and the men of the Bear Flag revolution. Then was added the 
figure of a man with an uplifted pick-ax, as an emblem of the 
great mining interests of the country. 

There is some dispute as to whether Lyon ever got the $1000 
voted him by the convention. The following article was pub- 
lished in the Alta California of February 19, 1850, and pre- 
sumably written by Edward Gilbert, the editor, a member of 
the Constitutional Convention, and one of the two Congress- 
men elected from California at the first election of 1849 : 

THE STATE SEAL— We observe that a petition has been 
made to the Legislature, on behalf of Caleb Lyon, for $1000 for 
the State Seal, "designed and executed by him." It may as 
well be understood at once that if any credit belongs to any 
person for the design of the seal, it is not to Caleb Lyon, of 
Lyonsdale. The original design for the seal was made by an 



358 CALIFORNIA 

officer of the army, sojourning temporarily at Monterey during 
the time the convention was in session. "When the subject of a 
seal was mooted, this design was shown to various members of 
the Convention, who suggested some amendments and the inser- 
tion of other matters. These were drawn in by the original 
designer, who did not wish it to be known who was the author, 
and the seal was presented by Mr. Lyon. After a pretty hard 
fight it was adopted, and $1000 appropriated to Mr. Lyon to 
procure a die and proper press. This duty he performed after 
a fashion. The design was marred in the engraving; the die 
was not sunk near deep enough, and the press was not suffi- 
ciently powerful for the purpose. The commissions of the 
congressional delegation were without the slightest impress of 
the seal before they left the country. If we are not very much 
mistaken, Mr. Lyon, of Lyonsdale, received his money out of 
the Civil Fund, and is now conveying it to the sylvan retreats 
of Lyonsdale. But this has nothing to do with the paternity 
of the seal. All we wish to state, and that most distinctly, is 
that Mr. Lyon has no right or title to the honor of either 
designing or executing the seal any more than the Khan of 
Tartary. 

The Legislature of 1850 did not make any appropriation in 
response to the petition mentioned. 

In October, 1855, a peculiar complication occurred between 
Governor Bigler and the Secretary of State, James W. Denver. 
Under the Constitution, as it then stood, the Secretary of State 
was the appointee of the Governor. Denver had been ap- 
pointed by Bigler on February 19, 1853. Afterwards a diifer- 
ence arose between the Governor and Secretary . of State. 
Denver had been elected to Congress in 1854, and on October 
5, 1855, Bigler addressed a letter to Denver demanding the 
great seal of the State, and said that he desired to keep it in his 
own office, where he claimed the Constitution contemplated that 
it should be kept. On the same day Denver replied, declining 
to permit the seal to pass out of his possession, and immediately 
departed for Washington to attend his congressional duties, 
leaving his deputy in charge of the Secretary's office. He also 



APPENDIX 359 

left a resignation to take effect November 5th. On the 6th ot 
October the Governor again visited the office of the Secretary, 
demanded the seal of the deputy, and was again refused its 
possession. He then handed to the deputy the commission of 
Charles H. Hempstead as Secretary of State, and directed the 
deputy to affix to it the seal, but the deputy refused to do so, on 
the ground that it was a constitutional office, and could not be 
vacated except by death, resignation, or impeachment. The 
deputy of Denver held possession of the office for a month, 
during which time his acts were not recognized as valid by the 
Governor, and it is said that the latter caused a duplicate great 
seal to be made, with which his official acts were attested by his 
newly appointed Secretary. Years afterwards it was stated 
that forged patents for State lands were in circulation, and that 
one of these old seals had been stolen and used for attesting 
them. However this may be, two dies of the State seal remain 
in the possession of the Secretary of State. 

In 1858 the State seal was damaged so that it failed to give a 
true impression, and a bill was introduced in the Senate by Mr. 
Thom to authorize the Secretary of State to procure a new seal, 
to be engraved on steel, and to be substituted for and used 
instead of the seal then in existence; and requiring him to 
destroy the then State seal in the presence of the Governor and 
Controller. The bill was accompanied with a design which 
reduced the size of the seal a twelfth part of an inch, and to 
admit of this contraction some of the details of the original 
design were omitted. The bear was made to crouch submis- 
sively at the feet of Minerva, the miner's cradle was left out, 
and the miner was brought nearer the water. On March 10, 
1858, the Senate amended the bill by providing that the design 
and size should be the same as the seal then in use, and on 
April 16th another amendment was adopted that "the design 
of the present seal shall be preserved intact in the new one, but 
the size thereof shall be reduced six-tenths of an inch in 
diameter." The bill with this amendment passed the Senate 
on April 21st, but was not considered in the House. 

Garnett, the designer of the original seal, was born in Vir- 



360 CALIFORNIA 

ginia about 1821 ; entered West Point 1837 ; graduated twenty- 
seventh in his class July 1, 1841, and appointed Brevet Second 
Lieutenant of artillery; was assistant instructor of infantry 
tactics at the military academy from July, 1843, to October, 
1844; was Aid-de-camp to General Wool in 1845, and distin- 
guished himself in the battles of Palo Alto and Reseca de la 
Paima ; was promoted to first lieutenancy August 18, 1846 ; was 
Aid-de-camp to General Taylor during the Mexican War and 
until 1849 : Brevetted Captain and Major for gallant and meri- 
torious conduct at Monterey and Buena Vista; transferred to 
the infantry in 1848 ; promoted to a captaincy in 1851 ; from 
1852 to 1854 was commandant of the corps of cadets and in- 
structor in 1855, and Major of the Ninth Infantry in the same 
month; was commander in the operations against the Indians 
on Puget Sound in 1856, and commanded the Yakima expedi- 
tion in 1858. At the breaking out of the Rebellion he took the 
side of the Confederates, was promoted to a brigadier general- 
ship and assigned to the Department of West Virginia. Here 
General McClellan attacked him, and after several days of 
alternate fighting and retreating, at the battle of Carrick's 
Ford, on July 15, 1861, Garnett was killed and his forces routed. 
His body was carefully cared for by the Federal commander, 
and after being embalmed was forwarded to his friends. 

Caleb Lyon was appointed Consul at Shanghai, China, by 
President Polk in 1845. On his return to New York he served 
in both branches of the Legislature, and in 1853 was elected 
from that State to Congress. In 1864 he was appointed Gov- 
ernor of Idaho Territory, and retained the office three years. 
He died at Rossville, New York, on September 9, 1875. 

Albrecht Kuner, a native of Lindau, Bavaria, a member of 
the California Pioneers, was the engraver of the original seal 
as designed by Caleb Lyon. Mr. Kuner died on January 23, 
1906, at his home in San Francisco. 



EL CAMINO REAL 

The famous road called El Camino Real, or "The King's 
Highway," which connected the twenty-one Franciscan Mis- 
sions in California, has been the subject of song and story for 
many a year. For a long time the old highway fell into disuse 
in places and for considerable stretches along the seven hundred 
miles of its length between San Diego and Sonoma. Lately, 
however, an association of patriotic men and women has done 
much to restore the road. The ancient trail has been at last 
restored and the whole distance practically marked by wayside 
bells hung from iron posts. The route taken by El Camino 
Real is as follows : 

Beginning at the Mission of San Diego and the old town of 
San Diego, the road of the padres passes through Morena, At- 
wood, Ladrillo, Sorrento, Delmar, Encinitas, Merl, Lacosta, 
Carlsbad, South Onofre, San Juan, Mission San Juan Capistrano 
(via south road), thence along the old Capistrano road to My- 
ford-Irving to Tustin, Santa Ana, Orange, Anaheim, Fullerton 
and La Habra to Whittier, East Whittier, San Gabriel, Alham- 
bra, Los Angeles, Hollywood, through Cahuenga Pass to Cala- 
basas. Grape Arbor, Newberry Park, Camarillo, Springville, El 
Rio, Montalvo, Ventura, Mission Buenaventura, El Rincon, 
Carpinteria, Ortega, Summerland, Miramar, Santa Barbara, 
Mission Santa Barbara, thence via HoUister Avenue to Goleta, 
Elwood, Gaviota, Mission Santa Ynez, Lompoc, Mission La 
Purisima Coneepcion, Harris, Santa Maria, Nipomo, Arroyo 
Grande, Pismo, San Luis Hot Sulphur Springs, Mission San 
Luis Obispo de Tolosa, Cuesta, Santa Margarita, Dove, Temple- 
ton, Paso Robles, Mission San Miguel, Pleyto, Jolon, Mission 
San Antonio de Padua, Lowes, Soledad, Mission Nuestra Senora 
de la Soledad, Salinas City, Natividad, Mission San Juan Bau- 
tista, Sargent, Gilroy, San Martin, Coyote, San Jose, Santa 
Clara, Palo Alto, Menlo Park, Redwood City, San Mateo, Burl- 



362 CALIFORNIA 

ingame, San Bruno (junction), Colma, to San Francisco. Also 
from San Rafael to Sonoma. 

From San Jose, El Camino Real leads to Mission San Jose; 
thence to San Leandro, Oakland, through to San Pablo. 

From Salinas City, El Camino Real leads to Monterey and to 
Mission San Carlos Borromeo del Carmelo de Monterey, 

From Santa Clara, El Camino Real leads to Santa Cruz ; from 
Santa Cruz the "Camino Real de Santa Cruz" leads to Mission 
San Juan Bautista. 

From Cahuenga Pass, "Camino Real de San Fernando" leads 
to Mission San Fernando Rey de Espana. 

From Mission San Gabriel Arcangel, "Camino Real de San 
Bernardino" leads to San Bernardino and the site of the Capilla 
de San Bernardino. 



THE GRAVE OF JUNIPERO SERRA 

During the years in which the Mission Church at Carmel 
was in a state of decay and neglect, following secularization, 
the resting place of Junipero Serra, founder of the Franciscan 
Missions in California, was almost completely forgotten. The 
floor of the once beautiful edifice was covered with debris, and 
there arose, at last, a doubt as to whether the dust of the 
greatest man in California's history really reposed in Cali- 
fornia soil. 

In order to settle these doubts, as well as for other praise- 
worthy reasons, an investigation into the circumstances of the 
death and burial of Father Serra was made in July, 1882, by 
Rev. Angelo D. Casanova, who was then pastor of the church of 
San Carlos at Monterey. The result was to remove the last 
vestige of doubt as to the resting-place of the great Franciscan. 
Father Casanova afterward made the following public state- 
ment regarding the matter : 

"In regard to the locating done in 1882, on the 3d of July, of the 
remains of the padres buried in the sanctuary of San Carlos church in 
Carmelo Valley — it was done to satisfy the wishes of many, and to con- 
vince others of their error in thinking that Father Junipero Serra was 
not buried there. After giving notice in the papers of San Francisco, 
over 400 people from the city, and from the Hotel del Monte, at the 
hour appointed, went to Carmelo. I, with the Kecords Defunctorum 
kept in the archives of the parish, in my hands, read aloud in Spanish 
and in English the certificate of Christian burial of each of the four 
Et. Eev. missionaries, describing the place, the side and the order of 
each one buried, saying on such a day in the sanctuary (or within the 
communion rail) on the gospel side, I buried so and so. The heavy 
stone slabs having been removed before the ceremony, the coffin of each 
stone tomb or grave was left visible. A man then went down and 
raised the lid of each coffin. The coffins were simple redwood, unplaned, 
and in a good state of preservation. The people all looked at the re- 
mains, first of Father John Crespi, the first that died, then on the re- 
mains of Father Junipero Serra. The skeletons were in good state, the 
ribs standing out in proper arch, part of the vestment in good order, 



364 CALIFORNIA 

also the heavy silk stole which is put only on priests, in good order and 
in one piece, two yards and a half long, with the silk fringes to it as 
good as new. We did not raise the coffins, but only viewed them and 
their contents to the satisfaction of all present. We did the same to 
the four corpses; anything more would have been improper, especially 
as the coffin of the last buried, the Rev. Father Lasuen, was going to 
pieces. Then the tombs were covered as before with stone slabs. The 
tomb of Father Junipero Serra, for better security, was filled with 
earth, so as to make it more difficult for any vandal to disturb his rest, 
and over that was placed the stone slab broken in four pieces." 

In connection with this important subject, the official record 
of the death of Serra will prove interesting. It is taken from 
the church records as written by Serra 's beloved friend, biogra- 
pher and successor, Father Francisco Palou: 

"He [Serra] prepared himself for death by making a general con- 
fession, as he had already done several times. Finding that the com- 
plaint in his chest was getting worse, and that he had some fever, on 
the 27th of the month he went on foot to the church. He there received 
the last sacred rites on his knees, to the edification of the people, and 
in their presence received the Holy Viaticum, as ordained in the Eoman 
Seraphic Ritual. When the ceremony commenced, the Father was on 
his knees, chanting with his sonorous voice, and to our astonishment, 
the 'Tantum Ergo.' In the same posture he gave thanks to our Lord; 
after which he returned to his room. At night he asked for the holy 
oils, and repeated with us the Penitential Psalms and the Litanies. 
The remainder of the same night he passed giving thanks to God, some- 
times on his knees, and sometimes sitting on the floor. He did not take 
to his bed, but was always dressed in his habit and cloak. At the 
break of day he asked me to give him the Plenary Indulgence, whi'.h 
he received kneeling. On the morning of the 28th he was visited by 
the captain of the bark, Don Jose Canizares, and chaplain. He received 
them sitting, expressing gratitude for their visit. He embraced the 
chaplain, giving thanks to God that, after traveling so much, they had 
arrived at last to throw a little earth on his remains. A few minutes 
after making this remark he said that he felt some fear, and asked me 
to read aloud the recommendations for the soul, which I did. He then 
responded as if in good health, and exclaimed with delight: 'Thank 
God! I am now without fear, and have nothing to dread. I feel better; 
let us go out.' He then arose, and afterwards sat down at the table 
and took a little broth. He then wished to rest, taking nothing off but 
his cloak. He laid tranquilly for a time, and then rested in the Lord. 
Without making any further sign he delivered his spirit unto the 



APPENDIX 365 

Creator, a little after two o'clock in the afternoon of the 28th, the feast 
of San Augustine, Doctor of the Church. When the bells began to toll, 
the little town was in a state of commotion: the Indians cried, lament- 
ing the death of their good Father, as likewise all the people, whether 
on shore or on board the ship. All asked for a remnant of the habit 
he had worn. They even went so far as to cut within the church pieces 
from the habit in which Fr. Junipero died. Before death, he ordered 
(without letting any of those present know of it) the carpenter of the 
presidio to make his coffin. We promised, if the multitude would hoid 
their peace, to devote a tunic of the deceased Father to scapulars for 
their benefit. Notwithstanding this, those who guarded the body in 
the church appropriated locks of his hair as keepsakes. This they were 
induced to do because of their regard for the departed. His funeral 
was attended by every one, whether on shore or aboard ship, each one 
doing what he could in honor of the deceased Father. The captain oi 
the bark utilized his artillery in conferring upon the deceased all the 
honors of a General, and the Eoyal Presidio of Monterey responded to 
the salute. The same marks were repeated on the 4th day of September, 
with vigil and high Mass, at which the same people attended. Upon 
this occasion another clergyman officiated, namely. Rev. Fr. Antonio 
Paterna, minister of the Mission of San Luis Obispo, who could not 
arrive in time for the funeral. And that everything said may appear 
of record, I sign this in said mission [Carmel], on the 5th day of Sep- 
tember, 1784." 

The church of the Mission at Carmelo is no longer neglected, 
thanks to the patriotism and zeal of the lovers of California's 
romantic and sacred past. The beautiful old edifice has been 
carefully roofed over and the wind has ceased to "blow the 
crockets from the wall," as Eobert Louis Stevenson said when 
he visited the place upon one of his wandering days from 
Monterey. 

In this connection we may well dwell with deep respect and 
gratitude on the painstaking care with which the early Fran- 
ciscan Fathers in California kept a chronicle of the events which 
marked their gentle rule in the new land. It is to these records 
that Bancroft and all the later historians were indebted for that 
which they have written of California's history. 

It is beyond the possibility of anything that can now be fore- 
seen that the resting places of the historic figures of the past 
will again be lost sight of. The people of the Golden State have 
aroused themselves to a sense of duty in this respect. And it is 



366 CALIFORNIA 

certain that, as time passes, the grave of Father Junipero in the 
peaceful Valley of Carmelo will become more and more a pil- 
grim's shrine, and that his name and fame are now forever 
secure against the insidious onslaughts of oblivion. 



MUSTER ROLL OF THE "VIGILANTES" 

Herewith is the official declaration upon which the "Com- 
mittee of Vigilance" was formed to preserve law and order in 
San Francisco in the wild days of 1851 when the gold rush 
attracted to California adventurers from the whole world. 
Attached to the declaration are the names of nearly all the 
"Vigilantes" to whose courage in days of stress and danger 
California owes an everlasting debt of gratitude: 

"Whereas, The citizens of San Francisco, convinced that 
there exists within its limits a band of robbers and incendiaries, 
who have, several times, burned and attempted to burn their 
city, who nightly attack their persons and break into their 
buildings, destroy their quiet, jeopardize their lives and prop- 
erty, and generally disturb the natural order of society; and 

"Whereas, many of those taken by the police have succeeded 
in escaping from their prisons by carelessness, by connivance, 
or from want of proper means or force to secure their confine- 
ment ; therefore, be it 

"Resolved, That the citizens of this place be made aware 
that the Committee of Vigilance will be ever ready to receive 
information as to the whereabouts of any disorderly or sus- 
picious person or persons, as well as the persons themselves 
when suspected of crime. 

"That as it is the conviction of a large portion of our citizens, 
that there exists in this city a nucleus of convicts and disorderly 
persons, around which cluster those who have seriously dis- 
turbed the peace and affected the best interests of our city — 
such as are known to the police of the city, or to the members of 
the Committee of Vigilance, as felons by conduct or association, 
are notified to leave this port within five days from this date; 
and at the expiration of which time they shall be compelled to 
depart, if they have not done so voluntarily within the time 
specified. 



368 



CALIFORNIA 



"Resolved, That a safety committee of thirty persons be 
appointed, whose sacred duty it shall be to visit every vessel 
arriving with notorious or suspicious characters on board, and 
unless they can present to said committee evidences of good 
character and honesty, they shall be re-shipped to the places 
from whence they came, and not be permitted to pollute our 
soil. 

"Resolved, That all good citizens be invited to join and assist 
the Committee of Vigilance in carrying out the above measures 
so necessary for the perfect restoration of the peace, safety^ 
and good order of our community." 

S. E. Woodworth Wm. H. Graham 

Fred A. Woodworth B. E. Babcock 



±^rancis E. Webster 
Wm. N. Thompson 
Clinton Winton 
James B. Huie 
B. Frank Hillard 
S. W. Haighf 
George H. Howard 
Caleb Hyatt 
Samuel E. Curwen 
James F. Curtis 
li. Hulsemann 
A. G. Eandall 
S. Brannan 
George J. Oakes 
E. D. W. Davis 
Wm. H. Jones 
Edward A. King 
William A. Howard 
Henry Dreshchfeldt 
James Eyan 
Wm. Browne 
Eobert Wells 
H. D. Evans 
John J. Bryant 
E. Kirtus 
Thos. N. Deblois 
E. Gorham 
Frank S. Mahoney 
James C. Ward 



J. A. Fisher 
Hartford Joy 
Joshua Hilton 
John F. Osgood 
James Pratt 
E. Kemp 
Wm. G. Badger 
J. Mead Huxley 
S. J. Stabler 
Geo. Clifford 
Charles Soule, Jr. 
Eobert H. Belden 
N. Smith 

Eandolph M. Cooley 
Chas. H. Hill 
James Shinaler 
J. W. Eickman 
W. S. Bromley 

A. Ottenheimer 

B. H. Davis 

P. Frothingham 
E. E. Schenck 
Geo. Austinworn 
E. Botcher 
Samuel Marx 
Da,niel J. Thomas, Jr. 
J. E. Farwell 
Jacob P. Leese 
Edgar Wakeman 



H. Hazeltine 

W. Iken 

George D. Lambert 

John P. Half 

Joseph T. Harmer 

J. Seligman 

H. F. Von Lenyerk 

J. E. Derby 

T. J. West 

Wm. T. Coleman 

J. S. Clark 

C. H. Clark 

Herman E. Haste 

H. F. Teschemacker 

Wm. J. Sherwood 

W. L. Hobson 

E, W. Travers 
W. H. Tillinghast 
Wm. Langerman 
J. F. Hutton 
Thos. K. Battelle 
Horace Morrison 
Augustus Belknap 

F. L. Dana 
Horatio S. Gates 
O. P. Sutton 
Jer. Spalding 

A. J. ElUs 
John M. Coughlin 
Samuel Moss, Jr. 
C. O. Brewster 



APPENDIX 



369 



E. S. Watson 
George Melius 
J. D. Stevenf^on 
Chas. E. Bond 

B. B. Arrowsmith 
S. E. Teschemacker 

C. H. Brinley 
J. W. Salmon 
Jesse Southam 
T. H. Eobinson 
George E. Ward 
C. L. Wilson 
W. H. Taber 
Isaac Bluxome, Jr. 
Lathrop L. Bullock 
John W. Eider 
Theodore Kuhlman 
Joseph E. Dale 
Julius D. Shultz 

J. P. Stevens 
Thomas McCahill 
Wm. Peake 
Jonas Minturn 
Lloyd Minturn 

F. O. Wakeman 
Wm. Forst 
John W. Jackson 
A. C. Tubbs 

J. R. Curtis 
A. H. Hill 



A. Markwell 
Samuel A. Sloane 
W, B. Lucas 
Henry M. Naglee 
J. Thompson Huie 
Otis P. Sawyer 
Wm. Meyer 
W. N. Hostin 
John G. McKaraher 
Eugene Hart 
John Eaynes 
J. C. Treadwell 
John H. Watson 
Wm. Burling 
F. Quincey Coale 
Thomas N. Cazneau 
Geo. W. Douglass 
Wm. C. Graham 
Chas. H. Vail 
Charles Minturn 
Howard Cunningham 
Charles L. Case 
Charles Moore 
James E. Duff 
E. M. Earle 
A. Wheelwright 
C. F. Fourgeaud 
A. Jackson McDuffie 
P. D. Headley 
S. B. Marshall 



Charles L. Wood 
William Tell 
James Dows 
Benjamin Eeynolda 
A. W. Macpherson 
John S. Eagan 
J. C. L. Wadsworth 
William Hart 
George M. Garwood 

E. S. Lanot 
J. Neal, Jr. 

F. A. Atkinson 
Charles Miller 
John O. Earle 
N. T. Thompson 

N. Reynolds Davis 

Gabriel Winter 

J. L. Van Bokkelen 

George N. Blake 

Dewitt Brown 

Edward F. Baker 

F. Argenti 

Stephen Payran 

C. Spring 

E. W. Crowell 

A. U. Gildemeester 

Samuel S. Phillippa 

Chas. Del Vecchio 

Joseph Post 

Jas. King of William 



INDEX 



INDEX 

Actimira, Pedro Jos6, 320. 

Agriculture, Governor de Neve's encouragement of, 124; Governor Bo- 

rica's encouragement of, 134; wheat crops in 1868, 281; effect of 

irrigation on, 298. 
Aguilar, Juan Maria de, 39. 
Alameda County, name and origin of, 309. 
Alberni, Pedro de, 133. 

Alegre, his account of Marques de Villa Puente, 328. 
Alemany, Archbishop, efforts to recover the Pious Fund, 338-339. 
Alpine County, name and origin of, 309. 
Alvarado, Juan Batista, conspiracy against, 177-180. 
Alviso, Jose Maria, lieutenant under General Castro, 193; captured by 

Americans, 194. 
Amador, Jose Maria, 309-310. 
Amador, Pedro, 309. 

Amador County, name and origin of, 309. 
Americans in Spanish and Mexican times. Governor Borica's attitude 

toward, 131-132; affair of the Lelia Byrd, 139-140; Captain Jedediah 

Smith's overland party, 166-171; Bear Flag Republic, 187-208; 

American conquest, 239-274. 
Angulo, Pedro, at Santa Barbara, 171-172. 
"Anian, " straits of, 30-31, 36, 39. 
Animals, discovery of prehistoric, 40. 
Anza, Juan de, quarrel with Eivera y Moneada, 122-123; Sonora to 

Monterey, 123; trip to San Diego, 123. 
Arce, Francisco de, 193; captured by Americans, 194. 
Archuleta, Ignacio, 126. 

Argentina, ship of Buenos Ayres Insurgents, 109. 
Argonauts, 209-238; class of immigrants by sea and rules and regulations 

of, 219; section of California covered with, 224; arrival of first, from 

Atlantic states, 280. 
Arguello, Concepcion, betrothed to M. de Resanoff and his death, 139-140. 
Arguello, Jose Dario, 129; governor, 142; his Spanish grant, 158. 
Arguello, Luis Antonio, letter to Governor Sola against Russians, 146; 

as governor, 162-166; bargain with Russian traders, 162; successful 

treatment of Indian uprising, 165-166; death, 162. 
Arguello, Luisa, marriage to Augustin Zamorano and wedding tour, 173. 
Arguello, Santiago, march against Buenos Ayres insurgents, 147. 
Arid lands, reclamation by irrigation, 297-298. 
Arrillago, Jose J., temporary governor, 129; report on pueblos, 129; as 

governor, 136-142; condition of presidios and his improvements of, 

136, 138; attitude toward foreigners, 139; toward Russians, 140-141; 

his death, 136, 141-142. 
Arrowhead Mountain, legend of, 10-12. 
Arroyo, Father, at Santa Ynez mission, 93; grammar of Indian language 

prepared by, 93. 
Aspires, Manuel, 340. 



374 CALIFORNIA 

Asser, Professor, 341. 

Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, see Santa F6 railway. 
Augustin I, emperor, see Iturbide. 

Avila, Jose Maria, how he killed Eomualdo Pacheco, 176. 
Ayala, Captain Juan M. enters San Francisco Bay with San Carlos, 
80-81. 

Bahia de los Fumos. See Santa Monica Bay. 

Ball at Monterey in honor of Governor Sola, 144. 

Bandini, Juan, 174, 179. 

Barri, Felipe de, 120; quarrel with missionaries and removal from office, 
121; succeeded by Governor de Neve, 121. 

Battalion of California volunteers, organization of, 204. 

Battles in California, Chino Eancho, 249-250; Laguna San Antonio, 200; 
Monterey, against Buenos Ayres insurgents, 109-110; Natividad, 
262; San Buenaventura, 179; San Gabriel river, 264; San Pasqual, 
257-262; Stanislaus river, 320. 

Bear Flag, description of, 187, 195-196. 

Bear Flag Republic, see Bear Flag Revolution. 

Bear Flag Revolution, 187-208; capture of Sonoma, 194-195; not ill- 
founded and unjust, 197-198; Fremont's part in, 198-208; end of, 207, 
239. 

Bear and bull fight in honor of Governor Sola, 144. 

Bears, white, 345. 

Benicia, capital of California, 273. 

Biddle, Commodore James, sent to succeed Commodore Shubrick, 269. 

"Big Four," Western Pacific acquired by, 293; Foundation of Southern 
Pacific, 293. 

Bigelow, John, his account of Col. Fremont's famous ride, 343-348. 

Bigler, Henry W. 217. 

Bigler, John, refusal of James Denver to give the State seal to, 358-359. 

Bodega, Fort, Russians at, 145, 162. 

Bonifacio, Senorita, Story of General Sherman and, 110-111. 

Borica, Diego de, appointed governor and journey to Monterey, 129-130; 
relations with missionaries, 131-132; founding of Villa Branciforte, 
132-135; death of, 135; endorsement of Arrillaga by, 136; attitude 
toward foreigners, 139. 

Bouchard, Hypolite, in command of Buenos Ayres insurgents, 147. 

Branciforte, Marquis de, viceroy of New Spain, reinforcements sent by, 
133, 

Branciforte, Villa de, foundation of, 132-134; failure of, 134-135. 

Bucareli, Antonio Maria, viceroy of New Spain, orders foundation of 
San Francisco presidio and missions at San Francisco and Santa 
Clara, 80-81; government of California given authority to make 
land grants, 121. 

Buena Vista, Marques de, gift to Pious Fund, 325. 

Buenos Ayres insurgents, appearance in Pacific as privateers and at- 
tack upon Monterey, 109-110, 147; at Santa Barbara, at San Pedro, 
at San Juan Capistrano, 147; Father Martinez against, 147. 

Bull and bear fight in honor of Governor Sola, 144. 

Burleigh drill, 287. 

Burnett, Peter H., governor of California, 273. 

Burroughs, Captain Charles, killed at Battle of Natividad, 262. 

Bustamante, Anastacio de, 178. 



INDEX 375 

Butron, Manuel, first private land grant in California given to, 121. 
Butte County, name and origin of, 310. 
Byrd, the Lelia, see Lelia Byrd. 

Caballero y Ozio, Juan, gift to Pious Fund, 325. 
Cabesa de Vaca, Alvara Nunez, in the City of Mexico, 24-26. 
Cabrillo, Juan Eodriguez, discovers California, 31, 38; explores Cali- 
fornia, 31-34; death of, 34, 53, 100, 139; log of, 45-54, 66; at Men- 
docino, 100; at San Miguel, 317. 
Cahuenga, treaty of, 266-267. 
Calaveras County, name and origin of, 310. 

California, name of, 23; as an island, 23; discovered by Cabrillo, 31, 38; 
explored by Cabrillo, 31-34; early accounts of, 40-41; Drake's ac- 
count of, 41; claimed for Spain, 72; expeditions sent out by Spain, 
323. 

Boundaries, Alta and Baja distinctly established, 136; of Cali- 
fornia, 135; present fixed, 273. 
Spanish era, 117-150; life at Monterey during, 104-116; end of, 
148-149; Mexican era, 151-186; Bear Flag Eepublic, 187- 
208; Argonauts, 209-238; as a state, 238, 273. 
Capitals: Monterey, 103; attempt to move to Los Angeles, 178; 
San Jose, 273; Vallejo, 273; Benicia, 273; Sacramento, 273- 
274. 
State seal, 355-359. 
Mountains of, 10-18; comparison in size of, 277; climate of, 277, 

278; soil, 2'77; area in acres, 297. 
See also under Commerce; Foreigners in Spanish and Mexican 
times; Governors, Mexican; Governors, Spanish. 
California Battalion, see Battalion of California volunteers. 
California Eepublic, see Bear Flag Eevolution. 
"California,'' newspaper, started in Monterey, 111. 
"California," steamship, 280. 

Calif ornians, life of, at Monterey, 104-116; horsemanship of, 347-348. 
Cambon, Father Pedro Benito; at San Gabriel mission, 77-78; at San 

Francisco mission, 80-81; at mission San Buenaventura, 84, 322. 
Capitals of California, Monterey made, 103; attempt to move from Mon- 
terey to Los Angeles, 178; San Jose made, 273; removed to Vallejo, 
273; Benicia made, 273; Sacramento, 273-274. 
Carmel, road from, to Monterey, 115-116. 
Carmel mission, see San Carlos mission. 

Carrillo, Carlos Antonio, conspiracy against Alvarado, 177-180; appoint- 
ed governor of California, 178; refusal of Gov. Alvarado to resign, 
178; in revolt against Americans in Los Angeles, 247. 
Carrillo, Jose Antonio, pronunciamento against Victoria signed by, 174; 
expatriated, 174; delegate to Mexican congress, 178; at battle at San 
Gabriel Eiver, 264. 
Carrillo, Eomona, marriage with Eomualdo Pacheco and wedding tour, 

173. 
Carson, Christopher, his part in Bear Flag Eevolution, 193-194; with 
Fremont at San Eafael, 2'00; his meeting with General Kearney, 
255-256; description of his appearance, 255; at the Battle of San 
Pasqual, 257-262. 
Casanate, Pedro Portal de, 323. 

Casanova, Angelo D., statement of, regarding death and burial of 
Father Serra, 363-364. 



376 CALIFORNIA 

Castillo, Alonzo del, 24. 

Castro, Jose, governor of California, military services against Carrillo, 
179, 180; quarrel between Pio Pico and, 184-185, 189; part in Bear 
Flag Revolution, 185, 193; Commodore Sloat's letter to, 240; his 
answer and actions, 243; delegation sent to Commodore Stockton 
by Pico and, 244-245; his retreat to Mexico, 245. 

Castro, Manuel, at battle of Natividad, 2'62. 

Catalina Island, see Santa Catalina Island. 

Cattle, industry in California, 162. 

Cavendish, Thomas, voyage to the Pacific, 36-37. 

Central Pacific Eailroad, promoters of, 282, 284; assistance from the 
government, San Francisco, California, and Nevada, 282; Theodore 
Judah's par+ in organization of company, 283-285, 293; Creed Hay- 
mond's description of difficulties in building, 285-290; completion of, 
and ceremonies attending, 290-293; Bret Harte's "What the engines 
said," 291-292. 

Channel Indians, see Santa Barbara Channel Indians. 

"Channel Islands," translation of Cabrillo's log as published in, 45-54. 

China, John Rogers Cooper's trip to, 163-164. 

Chinese laborers, "Crocker's battalions," 285. 

Chino Rancho, battle at, 249-250. 

Cibola, seven cities of, 24-30, 100; Fray de Niza's expedition to, 26-29. 

Citrus industry, effect of irrigation on, 298. 

Clark, J. Ross, connection with Salt Lake Railroad, 296. 

Clark, W. A., projector of the Salt Lake Railroad, 296. 

Clear Lake, massacre of Indians at, by Salvador Vallejo, 182-183. 

College of San Fernando in Mexico, Serra and Palou at, 61-62; Palou 
retires to, 89. 

Coloma, discovery of gold at, 212, 

Colorado River, 49. 

Columbia bar, mining camp, 224. 

Colton Hall, Monterey, convention at, 272. 

Colusa County, name and origin of, 310-311. 

Commerce and trade, with the Russians, 140, 162; during Mexican rule, 
153; anti-trading law passed by Mexico, 162-163; condition of, in 
1822, 162; Governor Arguello's disregard of law, 163-164; John 
Rogers Clark's arrival in Monterey and employment as trader, 163- 
164; why the Pacific Coast did not progress as rapidly, commer- 
cially, as Atlantic, 276-277; commercial awakening, 278-281; from 
1769-1840, 279-280; export trade in 1841, 279; trade in otter skins, 
279; Russian traders, 280; Hudson Bay company, 280; gold pro- 
duction in 1848, 1853-1864, 280-281; merchandise trade, 1848-1867, 
281; wheat crop in 1868, 281. 

Constitution, convention at Monterey for framing and ratification of, 
272-273. 

Contra Costa County, name and origin of, 311. 

Coon Hollow, gold output at, 231. 

Cooper, John Rogers, arrival at Monterey and emploj^ment as trader, 
and trip to China, 163-164. 

Cordoba, Alberto de, arrival in California of, 133; survey of San Fran- 
cisco by, 133; assists Governor Borica in building Branciforte, 134- 
135. 

Coronado, Francisco Vasquez de, expedition to seven cities of Cibola, 
29-30. 

Coronado Beach, 30. 



INDEX 377 

Cort6s, Hernando, conquest of, 23-24; expulsion of Jesuits from Mexico 

by, 56; decree passed secularizing the missions, 97. 
Costanso, Miguel, engineer, on expedition in search of Monterey, 66, 67. 
Counties of California, names and origin of, 309-322. 
Crespi, Father Juan, on expedition in search of Monterey, 66, 67, 316; 

Father Casanova's statement regarding burial of, 363. 
Crimes and punishments, during Father Serra's administration, 95; in 

1849, 229; Vigilance committee in San Francisco, 235-237. 
Crime and criminals, "The Hounds" in San Francisco, 231-235; in San 

Francisco, 234-235. 
Crocker, Charles, 282; member of Central Pacific Railroad company, 

284; part in building the road, 2'85, 290, 293. 
"Crocker's battalions," 285. 
Croix, Marques de, viceroy of New Spain, 101. 
Gushing, Caleb, 340. 
Cyane, TJ. S. ship, at Monterey, 205. 

Dana, Richard Henry, his description of pueblos, 153-155; his descrip- 
tion of San Francisco, 154-155. 

Davalos, Alonzo, gift to Pious Fund, 325. 

"Days of Forty-nine," official song of native sons of the Golden West, 
237-238. ' 

Declaration of Independence of California, 204. 

De la Cruz, Mateo Fernandez, gift to Pious Fund, 325. 

De la Guerra y Noriega, .Jose Antonio, 172; marriage of daughter to 
W. E. P. Hartnell, 172. 

De la Sierpe, Pedro Gil, 325. 

De la Torre, Joaquin, at battle of San Rafael, 200; pursuit of his party 
by Fremont, 202-204. 

De la Vega Vincent, his connection with the story of "The pearls of 
Loreto," 107-109. 

De Resnoff, N. P. See Rezanoff, N. P. 

Del Carmen, Jose, 250. 

Del Norte County, name and origin of, 311. 

^^^W^ oio""^^ ^^•' '■^^"^^^ 0^' *o give Governor Bigler the state seal, 

Desert, difficulties in building the railroad across, 289 

Desert Isles, Cabrillo at, 46. 

Diego, Bishop Francisco Garcia, in charge of the Pious Fund 334 

Discovery of gold. See Gold. 

Dominicans, dividing line between Franciscans and, 136; assigned to 
Lower California, 332'. 

Dorr, Ebenezer, captain of ship Otter, 139. 

Doyle, John T., narrative of the Pious Fund, 323-342; his effort to re- 
cover Pious Fund for the Church, 338-340. 

Drake. Sir Francis, voyage of, 34-38; his treatment of Indians, 35; re- 
turn to England, 36; purpose of explorations, 37-38; his failure to 
discover San Francisco Bay, 39-40, 278 

Drake's Bay, 35. 

Dumetz, Father Francisco, at San Fernando mission, 92. 

Duran, Father Narcisco, letter from Jedediah Smith to, 169; his peti- 
tion against General Vallejo's cruel treatment of Indians 181-182 

Durant, vice-president of Union Pacific railway, 290. 

Earthquakes, destruction of San Francisco by fire and, 300-301. 



378 CALIFORNIA 

Eaton, Fred, connection with Owens Eiver Aqueduct, 302-303. 

Echeandia, Jose Maria de, as governor, 166-173; attitude toward for- 
eigners and story of Jedediah Smith, 166-171. 

El Camino Real, 70, 98; route taken by, 361-362. 

El Dorado County, name and origin of, 311-312. 

Emery, Lieutenant, at battle of San Gabriel River, 264. 

Emigrant Cap, difficulties in building railroad from, to Truckee, 286-287. 

Engelhardt, Father Zephyrin, his account of Father Serra's most famous 
walk, 349-354. 

Estanislao, Chief, battle against the Spanish, 320, 321. 

Estevanico, negro with Marcos de Niza, 24, 26, 27, 28. 

"Eureka," motto on seal of California, 274. 

Ezeta, Captain Bruno, 321. 

Fages, Pedro, Lieutenant on Ship San Carlos, 63; on expedition in search 
of Monterey, 66, 67; quarrel with missionaries and removal from 
office, 121; as governor, 127-128; letter to Ignacio Vallejo, 128; 
Spanish grants given by, 158, 321; Serra's charges against, 352; 
instructions to, in regard to missions, 352-353. 

Fages, Senora, Governor Fages' wife, 128. 

Farallones, Isles of the, 67. 

Feather Eiver, 316. 

Ferrelo, Bartolome, explores California, 34, 39; in charge of Cabrillo's 
fleet, 53. 

Fires, San Francisco destroyed by earthquake and, 300-301. 

Flags, Mexican at Monterey, 148; Mexican hauled down from Sutter's 
Fort, 194-195; Bear, 187, 195-196. 

Flores, Jose Maria, Commodore refuses to treat with, 244-245, 263; in 
defense of Los Angeles, 247; Andres Pico's report of battle of San 
Pasqual to, 261. 

Ford, William, 200. 

Foreigners during Spanish and Mexican times, immigrants by sea and 
rules and regulations of, 219; Governor Borica's attitude toward, 
139; Governor Sola's attitude toward, 145. 

Americans: first American ship to visit California, 139; affair 
of brig Lelia Byrd, 140; Jedediah Smith's overland party, 
166-171; English, 139. 
French, threatened invasion, 133. 

Russians, 139, 140-141; M. de Rezanoff, 139-140; at Fort Bodega, 
145, 162; missions established as barriers to, 145-146; trade 
with, 162, 280. 

Fort Hill, surrender of Gillespie's forces at, 250-251. 

Fort Ross, see Ross, Fort. 

Fortilla, Pablo de, see Portilla, Pablo de. 

Franciscans, work with Indians in California, 55; at Santa Barbara, 86; 
dividing line in California between Dominicans and, 136; Jesuit 
missions transferred to, 332'. 

Freight, cost of, in building Central Pacific railroad, 288. 

Fremont, John C., sent to survey Rocky Mountain country, 191; Amer- 
icans advise with, 193; his part in the Bear Flag Revolution, 198- 
206; personal appearance, 199; pursuit of Captain de la Torre's 
party, 202-204; made commander of Bear Flag Republic, 204; or- 
ganization of "California battalion of mounted riflemen," 204; 
despatched by Stockton to San Diego, 244; at Los Angeles, 246; at 
Monterey, 251; Stockton's letter to, 265-266; governor of California, 



INDEX 379 

269; instructions sent by Kearney to, 270; quarrel between Colonel 
Mason and, 270; court-martialed and his resignation from army, 
270-271; again in California, 2'71; United States senator, 273; ac- 
count of his ride from Los Angeles to Monterey and back, 343-348. 

French in California, threatened invasion of, 133. 

Frenzeny, painted bar of Sanchez's saloon, 112-113. 

Fresno County, name and origin of, 312. 

Fry, Sir Edward, arbitrator for Pious Fund, 341. 

Fuca, Juan de, claims to have passed through "Anian," 30-31, 36. 

Gale, William A., establishment of mercantile house by, 164. 

Galv6z, Jose de, his connection with Father Serra, 56-57, 63; character 
of, 57; expedition sent to California by, 58-59, 101; sites for first 
missions selected by, 59; sends relief to San Diego, G9-71; Por- 
toli selected for governor by, 120; his idea of missions, 121. 

Gandia, Duchess of, gift to Pious Fund, 328-329. 

Gantt, John, Pio Pico's contract with, 184. 

Gareias, Manuel, at battle of San Gabriel River, 264. 

Garnett, Major Robert Selden, designer of the State seal, 274, 355, 357; 
sketch of his life, 359-360. 

Gilbert, Edward, editor of "Alta California," 357; his repudiation of 
Caleb Lyon, 357-358; elected to Congress, 273. 

Gillespie, Archibald H., in command of Los Angeles, 246; forced to 
capitulate, 246-251; battle of San Pasqual, 256-262'; character of, in 
California, 260; with Stockton, 271. 

Glenn, Dr. Hugh J., 312. 

Glenn County, name and origin of, 312. 

Gold, undiscovered by Spanish, 212; discovery of, 211, 212-218; con- 
dition of California six months after discovery of, 225; production 
of early mines, 230-231; production of, in 1848, 280; in 1853, 280; 
until 1864, 281; effect of discovery of, on trade, 278-280. See also 
under Mines and Mining. 

Golden Gate first entered by Juan de Ayala, 80. 

Gomez, Father Francisco, sails for California, 63; on expedition in 
search for Monterey, 66, 67; at San Diego mission, 71. 

Gonzalez, Macedonio, 179. 

Gould Lines. See Western Pacific Railroad. 

Governors, Mexican, List of, 184. 

Governors, Spanish, position of, 119. See also under Portol^, Barri, de 
Neve, Fages, Romeu, Arrillaga, Borica, Arguello, Sola. 

Goycoechea, Felipe de, 129. 

Grass Valley, 224, 231. 

Green, General Will, 311. 

"Green is the way to Monterey" (poem), 115-116. 

Grigsby, John, 201. 

Guadalupe, Hidalgo, treaty of, 271. 

Guadalupe River, in Santa Clara County, 126. 

Guarnasehelli, Senator, 241, 

Guijarros Point. See Loma, Point. 

Gwin, William M., United States Senator, 273. 

Hague Convention, Court of arbitration in regard to Pious Fund, 340- 

342. 
Halleck, Henry W., 357. 
Hangtown. See Placerville. 



380 CALIFORNIA 

Harte, Francis Bret, "What the engines said," 291-293. 

Hartnell, William P., Father Pay eras' contract with, 163; establishment 
of mercantile house by, 164; his marriage, 172. 

Haymond, Creed, his description of difficulties in constructing the Cen- 
tral Pacific Eailroad, 285-290. 

Henley, William Ernest, Stevenson's letter to, 113. 

Herrera, Isabel, story of the "Pearls of Loreto," 106-108. 

Hidalgo, Manuel, how he started the Mexican revolution, 141. 

Hides, trade in, 162; trade in, by the missionaries, 279. 

Hittell, Theodore, his account of the massacre of Indians at Clear 
Lake, 182-183. 

Holder, Charles Frederick, translation of Cabrillo's Log as published by, 
45-54. 

Hollywood. See Cahuenga. 

Hopkins, Mark, 282, 293. 

Horsemanship, Bancroft's reference to, 347-348. 

Horses, power of endurance of California, illustrated by Fremont 's ride, 

343-348; test of, 346. 
"Hounds," in San Francisco and how suppressed, 231-235. 
"How much can you raise in a pinch," origin of expression, 227-228. 
Howard, General O. O., his interpretation of name Modoc, 315. 
Hudson Bay Company, trade with, 280. 
Humboldt County, name and origin of, 312. 
Huntington, C. P., 282; his connection with Central Pacific Eailroad, 

284, 285, 293. 

Ide, William B., his proclamation at Sonoma, 185-186; in Bear Flag 
Revolution, 192; Bear Flag Republic proclamation, 197-198; sketch 
of his life, 198; his account of Fremont's arrival at Sonoma, 201- 
202; supplanted by Fremont, 204. 
Imperial County, name and origin of, 312. 
Imperial Valley, effect of irrigation on, 298. 
Independence of California, declaration of, 204. 
Indian villages, names of, 50, 51. 

Indians, in California, 40; Cabrillo's account of, 40, 47-51, 53; Sir 
Francis Drake's account of, 41; of Point Reyes, 41; around San 
Francisco Bay, 41-42; of Santa Barbara Channel Islands, 42, 53; in 
San Joaquin Valley, 42; life of, 41; on Santa Catalina, 48; of Santa 
Monica Bay, 48-49; at San Carlos mission, 73; at mission San An- 
tonio, 76-77; at San Gabriel, 78; at San Juan Capistrano, 82; at 
Santa Barbara mission, 85; Napa tribe, 315. 

Franciscans work with, 55-56; number of, converted during 
Serra's administration, 87; grief of, upon death of Serra, 
88; their love of missionaries, 96; effect of missions on, 
95-96, 98; assist Father Martinez against Buenos Ayres 
insurgents, 147. 
Sir Francis Drake's treatment of, 35; General Vallejo's cruel 
treatment of, 181-182; massacre of, at Clear Lake, 182-183; 
Pio Pico's treatment of, 184. 
Uprising of, at San Diego mission, 68; murder of Father Jayme 
by, 123; attack on Santa Ynez and La Purisima missions, 
165-166; fight between valley tribes and Sierra tribes, 310 j 
uprising and battle on Stanislaus River, 320. 



INDEX 381 

Legend of Arrowhead Mountain, 11-12; story of the "woman 

of San Nicolas," 43-45. 
Names of islands, 53; names of villages, 50, 51, 53; grammar of, 
prepared by Father Arroyo, 93. 
Intermarriages, of Calif ornians and Englishmen, 164; of Eussians and 

Spanish, 164. 
Inyo County, name and origin of, 312. 
Iron rails, cost of, for Central Pacific Eailroad, 288. 
Irrigation, area of irrigated territory in California, 297; yearly expend- 
iture on, 298; Imperial Valley and, 298; effect on citrus industry, 
298-299. 

Jacksonville, mining camp, 224. 

Jayme, Father Luis, killed by Indians, 123. 

Jesuits, missions in Baja California; 56; expulsion of, from Mexico, 56, 

120, 331-332; in Mexico and Lower California, 32'3-332; Fathers 

Kino and Salvatierra's mission, 330-331; missions in California 

transferred to Franciscans, 332. 
Johnson, Captain, at battle of San Pasqual, 258; his death, 2'58. 
Juan Eodriguez Island, 53. 
Iturbe, Augustin de, empire of, 117; Sola surrenders California to, 

148-149. 
Judah, Theodore, engineer, his part in organization of Central Pacific 

Eailroad Company, 283-285, 293. 
Junta directiva, 333. 

Kansas City, trade between, and Santa Fe, 294. 

Kearney, General Stephen W., message to Stockton, 252-253; instructions 
to, 253-254; in California, 254-256; battle of San Pasqual and his 
defeat, 257-262'; at battle on San Gabriel Eiver, 262-264; in Los 
Angeles, 265; relations with Commodore Stockton, 267-268; his re- 
lations with General Fremont, 268-271. 

Kelsey, mining camp, 224, 230. 

Kern County, name and origin of, 312. 

"La Favorita. " See Herrera, Isabel. 

La Frambeau, Michel, 310, 320. 

Kings County, name and origin of, 313. 

King's Highway. See El Camino Eeal. 

Kino, Father E. F., authority given to, to undertake the conversion of 
California, 324, 330-331. 

Kofkoff, Alexander. See Koskoff, Alexander. 

Koskoff, Alexander, at Fort Eoss, 146. 

Kuner, Albrecht, engraver of original state seal, 360. 

Kyburz, Samuel, 214. 

La Paz, 100. 

"La Penetentia," 125, 

La Purisima mission, foundation of, 89; attack on, by Indians, 165-166. 

La Vittoria. See Santa Catalina Island, 

Laguna San Antonio, skirmish at, 200. 

Lake County, name and origin of, 313. 

Land grants, Bucareli's instructions as to, 121; first in California, 121; 

first in San Jose pueblo, 12'6; Mexican grants, 158-159, 161-162; 

Spanish, 158, 161. 
Larkin, Thomas O., at Monterey, 190; advice to Stockton and to Pio 

Pico 244; with. Stockton, 245, 246, 270. 



382 CALIFORNIA 

"Las Sergas de Esplandian," name "California" first mention in, 23. 

Las Vegas and Tonopah Railroad, branch of Salt Lake Railroad, 297. 

Lassen, Peter, 313. 

Lassen County, name and origin of, 313. 

Lasuen, Father Fermin Francisco de, at San Juan Capistrano mission, 

82; at Santa Barbara mission, 85; Father president of missions, 

89; character of, 89; at La Purisima mission, 89; at San Jose, 90; 

at San Miguel mission, 91. 
Law, early mining and other, 229; in San Francisco in 1849, 233-234; 

Vigilance committee, 235-237. 
Legends, of Arrowhead Mountain, 10-11; of "Woman of San Nicolas," 

43-45; of "Pearls of Loreto," 106-108. 
Legislative Council, 269. 
Legislature, first, of California, 273; election of United States Senators 

and Statehood granted, 273. 
Lelia Byrd, affair of, and result, 139-140. 
Levant, U. S. Ship, at Monterey, 205. 
Lohman, Alexander, 341. 

Loma, Point, formerly Point Guijarros, 140. 
Lopez, Father Baldomero, 319. 

Loreto, legend of the "Pearls of Loreto," 106-108. 
Los Angeles, pueblo of, 14, 79, 118, 124, 126-127, 302; population in 

1800, 138, in 1905, 302; condition of, during Mexican rule, 155-156; 

attempt to move capital to, 178; occupied by Stockton, 245-246; 

revolt of Californians at, 246-251. 
Los Angeles Aqueduct. See Owens River Aqueduct. 
Los Angeles County, name and origin of, 313; Spanish grant given in, 

158. 
Los Angeles River, 126. 

Los Angeles Terminal Railway, purchase of, 296. 
Los Flores, surrender of Carrillo 's troops at, 179-180. 
Los Robles, San Antonio de Padua mission founded at, 76-77. 
Lugo, Antonio Maria, sketch of life, 159-161; his Spanish grant, 159-160. 
Lyon, Caleb, design for state seal presented by, 355; repudiation of, as 

designer of seal, 357-358; offices held by, 360. 

McDougall, John, Lieutenant-governor, 2'73. 

McEnerney, Garret, argument before the Hague, 341-342. 

Malibu Hills, 40. 

Madera County, name and origin of, 313. 

Marcos de Niza, journey to the Seven cities of Cibola, 26-30. 

Marin County, name and origin of, 314. 

Mariposa County, name and origin of, 314. 

Marsh, John, Pio Pico's contract with, 184. 

Marshall, James W., gold discovered by, 212-218; sketch of, 218-219; with 
Fremont at San Rafael, 200. 

Martinez, Father Luis Antonio, assistance against Buenos Ayres in- 
surgents, 147-148. 

Maslin, Prentiss, data concerning names and origin of counties of Cali- 
fornia prepared by, 309-322. 

Mason, Colonel Richard B., governor of California, 269; arrival at Los 
Angeles and quarrel with Fremont, 270; succeeded by Bennet Riley, 
272. 

Matzer, 341. 

Meadow Valley, 296. 



INDEX 383 

Mendocino, Cape, 34; Cabrillo at, 100. 

Mendocino County, name and origin of, 314-315. 

Merced County, name and origin of, 315. 

Merritt, Ezekiel, 192; his part in the Bear Flag Revolution, 192, 194. 

Mervine, Captain William, 205; defeated by Americans and his retreat, 
252. 

Mexican Empire, recognized in California, 148-149; proclamation of 
Augustin I, 148-149. 

Mexican flag, 192. 

Mexican governors. See Governors of California, Mexican. 

Mexican land grants. See land grants. 

Mexico, Governor Sola's transfer of California to, 148-149; California 
under, 151-186; war declared between United States and, 206. 

Micheltorena, M., governor of California, 182-183. 

Military affairs, condition of presidios and Governor Arrillaga's improve- 
ments, 138. 

Military garrison, at Sonoma, 191. 

Military organizations, California battalion of mounted riflemen, 204. 

Mines, miners and mining laws, names of camps, 224; condition of Cali- 
fornia six months after discovery of gold, 225; pan mining, 227; 
typical mining expressions, 227-228; mining appliances, 228; mining 
laws, 229; production of early mines, 230, 231; songs sung in camp, 
237-238. 

Miravalles, Conde de, gift to Pious Fund, 325. 

Missions, selection of first three sites, 59; names of, of Upper California 
and dates of their foundation, 332-333; building of, 275; plan of 
buildings, 353-354; La Purisima, 89, 165-166; San Antonio de Padua, 
76-77; San Buenaventura mission, 59, 84, 350; San Carlos, 59, 72-75, 
101, 103, 87, 121; San Diego, 59, 68-71; San Fernando, 92; San 
Francisco, 80-81; San Francisco Solano, 93-94; 146; San Gabriel, 
77-78; San Jose, 90; San Juan Bautista, 91; San Juan Capistrano, 
82; San Luis Obispo, 79-80; San Luis Key, 92-93; San Miguel, 91; 
San Eafael, 145; Santa Barbara, 84-86; Santa Clara, 83-84; Santa 
Cruz, 89; Santa Ynez, 93; Sierra Gorda, 61-62; Soledad, 90. 

Palou succeeds Serra as president of, 89; life at, 94-96; progress 
of, 96; secularization planned by Spain, 96-97; state of, 
when United States came into possession of California, 
97-98; Galvez' idea for protection of, 121; Governor Borica's 
relation with, 131-132; products of, 162-279; advances money 
for Cooper's trip to China, 163-164; Serra 's statement to 
Bucareli in regard to state of missions in California, 351; 
Father Palou 's report, 353. 
Franciscans' work with Indians, 55; Indians love of, 96; effect 
of, on Indians, 98; Indian uprising of 1824, attack upon 
Santa Ynez and La Purisima missions, 165-166. 
Missions in Lower California, names and founders of, 32'6; Dominicans 
in, 332. 

Modoc County, name and origin of, 315. 

Mono County, name and origin of, 315. 

Monterey, Conde de, viceroy of New Spain, 100, 315. 

Monterey, named, 38-39, 100; Portola's expedition in search of, 65-67; 
Portola's second expedition and arrival at, 71-72; official statement 
of discovery of, 101; Juan Perez at, 101; arrival of Ship San An- 
tonio at, 101; "Serra tree" at, 102; capital of California, 103, 269; 
life at, 104-116; first newspaper established at. 111; Commodore 



384 CALIFORNIA 

Sloat's arriv^al at and raising of American flag, 110; Robert Louis 
Stevenson in, 112-114; trail blazed by Anza from Sonora to, 123; 
Governor de Neve's arrival at, 124; council held at, to appoint 
Arrillaga, 129; Peter Puget at, 132; Buenos Ayres insurgents at- 
tack upon, 147; Mexican flag over, 148; Dana's description of, 
156-157; attempt to move capital, 178; American flag raised over, 
185; Kearney at, 269; Fremont's return to, 251; convention held for 
framing of Constitution, 272-273. 

Monterey County, name and origin of, 315. 

Monterey Mission. See San Carlos mission. 

Monterey Presidio, foundation of, 72, 101. 

Montgomery, Captain, in command of U. S. Portsmouth, 203; at Yerba 
Buena, 203, 205. 

Moraga, Jose Joaquin, at foundation of San Jos6, 12*5-126; 310, 316, 321. 

Mormon Trail, 295-296. 

Mormons, 269. 

Moscow, U. S. brig, 202, 203. 

Mountains, Arrowhead and legend, 10-12; Rubidoux, 13. 

Muir, John, greeting from, on Mt. Rubidoux, 13. 

Mulholland, William, his connection with Owens River Aqueduct, 301- 
304; sketch of his life, 303-304. 

Name "California." See under California. 

Native Sons of the Golden West, official song of organization of, 237-238. 

Natividad, battle of, 262. 

Nevada City, 224, 231, 235. 

Nevada County, name and origin of, 316. 

Nevada State, assistance of, in building Central Pacific railroad, 282. 

Neve, Felipe de, at San Buenaventura mission, 84; foundation of Santa 
Barbara presidio under, 85; governor, 121; arrival at Monterey, 
124; founds pueblos of San Jose and Los Angeles, 79, 124-127; his 
relations with Father Serra, 124; his famous Reglamento and its 
provisions, 124; instructions from Mexico to, to erect pueblos, 125; 
honored by Spain, 127; his death, 127. 

New Helvetia, 254, 321. 

Newspapers, " Calif ornian," 111. 

Nieto, Manuel, his Spanish grant, 158. 

Niza, Father Marcos de, expedition in search of Seven cities of Cibola, 
26-29. 

North, John, president of Pioneer Society, 299; story of original orange 
tree, 299. 

Northwest Passage, Drake's search for, 36. 

Oaks, at Monterey, 102. 

Orange County, name and origin of, 316. 

Orange industry, "original orange tree," 299; how Washington navela 
were brought to California, 299. 

Orantes, Andreas de, 24. 

Oregon, steamship, 280. 

Orellana, Francis, his account of fictitious province in South America, 
311-312. 

Ortega, Jose Francisco de, sergeant on expedition on search for Mon- 
terey, 66; at discovery of San Francisco Bay, 67; at San Diego 
mission, 71, 129. 

Osbourne, Fanny, 112. 



INDEX 385 

Otondo, Admiral Isidro, expedition to California under, 323-324. 

Otter, Boston ship, 139. 

Otters, trade in, 279, 162. 

Ottinger, Captain, 312. 

Owens Eiver Aqueduct, story of, 301-304; William Mulholland, 301-304; 

Fred Eaton's connection with, 304-303; cost of, 303; amount of 

supply, 304. 

Pacheco, Eomualdo, marriage and wedding tour, 73; placed in command 
of troops, unheeded advice to Victoria, his bravery and death, 176. 

Palomares, Ignacio, 180. 

Palou, Father Francisco, 61; at San Fernando college, 61-62; at San 
Francisco mission, 80-81; succeeds Serra, 89; returns to San Fer- 
nando college, 89; report on first four years in California, 353; his 
oflScial record of Serra 's death, 364-365. 

Pan, its use in mining, 227. 

Parron, Father Fernando, on ship San Carlos, 63; at San Diego mis- 
sion, 71. 

Paterna, Father, 350. 

"Pathfinder." See Fremont, John C. 

Payeras, Father Mariano, contract with Hartnell for trade, 163. 

Pearl fisheries, at Monterey, 106-107. 

"Pearls of Loreto," legend of, 106-108. 

Pena, Father, 350. 

Pepper tree, original, at San Luis Key mission, 93. 

Perea, Juan, sails for California, 63; arrival at Monterey, 101. 

Peyri, Father Antonio, at San Luis Rey mission, 93. 

Phelps, William B., his account of Fremont's pursuit of de la Torre's 
party, 202-204. 

Piccolo, Father Francisco Maria, his association with Father Kino, 330; 
joins Father Salvatierra, 330. 

Pico family, Spanish grant given to, 158. 

Pico, Andres, 179; taken prisoner by Castro, 180; in revolt against 
Americans in Los Angeles, 247; at battle of San Pasqual, 256-262; 
at battle of San Gabriel River, 264; in command at capitulation 
of Cahuenga, 266. 

Pico, Pio, his attempt to move capital to Los Angeles, 178; his attitude 
toward Carrillo's conspiracy, 179, 174; his treatment of the Indians, 
184; his disloyalty to California during the Bear Flag Revolution, 
185; quarrel between Castro and, 184-185, 189; Commodore Sloat's 
letter to, 240; his orders, 243; Thomas Larkin's advice to, 244; 
Stockton refuses to treat with delegation sent by, 244-245; his re- 
treat to Mexico, 255. 

Pilot Hill, mining camp, 224. 

Pinos, Point, 33; Portola's second expedition at, 71. 

Pioche, Nevada, 297. 

Pioneer Society, John North, president of, 299. 

Pious Fund, 323-342; gifts to, 324-330; seized by Spain and how man- 
aged, 333; under Mexican government, 333-334; transferred to 
Bishop Diego, 334; seized by Mexican government, 334; sale of prop- 
erty and results, 334-338; efforts to recover, for the Church, 338-340; 
decision of commission in regard to accrued interest, 340; payment 
of interest by Mexico, 340; submitted to court of arbitration, 340- 
341; Garret McEnerney's argument before the Hague Tribunal, 341. 

Pirates, in California, 109; Buenos Ayres insurgents, 109-110. 



386 CALIFORNIA 

Place of the Two Shrines. See Santa Clara Valley. 

Placer County, name and origin of, 316. 

Placerville, formerly mining town, "Hangtown," 22'4, 231. 

Plaza Church of Los Angeles, foundation of, 127. 

Plumas County, name and origin of, 316. 

Point Eeyes, 67; Indians of, 41. 

Polk, President, accepts verdict against Fremont, but remits the sen- 
tence, 271. 

Population, of California, in 1800, 137; in 1848, 280; of Los Angeles in 
1800, 138; of Los Angeles in 1905, 302; of San Jose in 1800, 138. 

Porciuncula Eiver at Los Angeles, 126. 

Portilla, Pablo de, his march against Governor Victoria, 174-176; joins 
Carrillo's conspiracy, 179. 

Portola, Gaspar de, march to Alta California, 63; arrival at San Diego, 
64, 117; expedition in search of Monterey, 65-67; discovers San 
Francisco Bay, 67; returns to San Diego, 68; relief sent from Spain 
and his second expedition and arrival at Monterey, 69-72; governor 
of California, 103, 119-120; his part in expulsion of the Jesuits, 120. 

Portsmouth, U. S. ship, at Yerba Buena, 203, 205. 

Posesion, Isla de, called La Isla de Juan Eodriguez, 53. 

Poverty Flat, mining camp, 224. 

Powder, amount used in building railroad across the Sierra, 287-288. 

Prat, Pedro, surgeon of San Carlos, 63. 

Presidios, San Carlos, "Royal presidio," 72; foundation of Monterey, 
72, 101; San Francisco, 80; Santa Barbara, 85; provision for govern- 
ment of, 12'4; condition of and Arrillago's improvements of, 138. 

Price, Eodman, 356. 

Privateers. See Buenos Ayres insurgents. 

Proclamation, Commodore Sloat's on raising American flag, 240-243. 

Prudon, Victor, 192. 

Pueblo de las Canoas, 49. 

Pueblos, Governor de Neve's reglamento as to, 124; foundation of San 
Jose, 124; foundation of Los Angeles, 125-126; instructions to Gov- 
ernor de Neve to erect, 125; solars, building lots in, 126; Governor 
Arrillaga's report on condition of, 129; during Mexican rule, 153- 
157; Dana's description of, 153-155. 

Puente, Marques de Villa, account of, 326-328. 

Puget, Peter, in Monterey harbor, 132. 

Purisima mission. See La Purisima mission. 

"Queen of the Missions." See San Gabriel mission. 
Quentin, sub-chief of the Licatiut tribe, 314. 
Quivira, 39. 

Railroads in California, in 1868, 281-282; Central Pacific, 2'82-293; Santa 
F6, 293-294; Las Vegas and Tonopah, 297; Salt Lake, 295-297; 
Union Pacific, 290; Western Pacific, 295. 

Ramirez, Jose, 180. 

Ramirez, Pedro, correspondence in regard to Pious Fund, 336-337, 338. 

Reclamation of Deserts, area of irrigated territory, 297; cost of irriga- 
tion yearly, 298; Imperial Valley, 298. 

Reglamento, Governor de Neve's, 124. 

Religious service, first Christian in California, 35; first Roman Catholic, 
in California, 39. 

Republic of California. See Bear Flag Revolution. 



INDEX 387 

Revere, Joseph Warren, 206-207. 

Rezanoflf, N. P. de, in California, Lis betrothal to Concepcion Arguello 

and his death, 140-144. 
Eidley, Robert, captain of the port of Yerba Buena, 202'. 
Riley, Bennet, governor of California, 272-273. 
Rivera y Moncado, Fernando de, at San Diego 64; on expedition in 

search of Monterey, 66-67; authority to make land grants given, 

121; excommunicated and appeal to Serra, 122; quarrel with Anza, 

122-123. 
Riverside, 13; original orange tree in, 299. 
Riverside County, name and origin of, 316. 
Roca, Jose, 133. 

Rocker, as mining appliance, 228. 
Rocky Mountain survey, Fremont sent to make, 195. 
Rodriguez, Juan, 49. 
Rogers, Woodes, voyage of, 37. 
Romeu, Jose Antonio, governor of California, uneventful administration 

of, 128-129; illness and death, 128-129. 
Roosevelt, Theodore, transplanting of "original orange tree" by, 2'99. 
Ross, Fort, Alexander Kofkoff in charge, 146. 
Rover, Boston schooner, arrival in Monterey, 163. 
Royal chapel. See San Carlos mission. 
Royal presidio. See Monterey presidio. 
Royal road. See El Camino Real. 
Rubidoux Mountain, cross erected in memory of Serra on, 13; greeting 

from John Muir, 13. 
Russians, M. de Rezanoff in California, 139-140; Governor Arrillaga's 

attitude toward, 140-141; at Fort Bodega, 145, 162; Luis Antonio 

Arguello 's letter to Governor Sola against, 146; San Rafael and 

San Francisco Solano missions established as barriers to, 145-146; 

Governor Arguello 's bargain with traders, 162; trade with, 280. 

Sacramento, distributing point for the mines, 224, 231; capital of Cali- 
fornia, 273-274. 

Sacramento County, name and origin of, 316. 

Saint Joseph, patron saint of California, 63. 

Sal, Hermenegildo, 129. 

Salazar, Father, 319. 

Salinas River, 76. 

Salt Lake, Captain Jedediah Smith at, 167, 170. 

Salt Lake Railroad, 295; projectors of, 296; scenic beauties of, 296; Las 
Vegas and Tonapah, branch of, 297. 

Palvatierra, Father Juan Maria, authority given to, to undertake the 
conversion of California, 324; in Mexico, 330; in Lower California, 
330-331. 

San Antonio, ship, sails for California, 63; at Monterey, 101. 

San Antonio de Padua mission, foundation of, 76-77; Indians at, 76-77. 

San Benito County, name and origin of, 316-317. 

San Benito Valley, San Juan Bautista mission in, 91. 

San Bernardino, Captain Jedediah Smith at, 170. 

San Bernardino County, name and origin of, 317. 

San Bernardino Mountains, legend of Arrowhead, 10-12. 

San Bias, port of, necessity of keeping open, urged by Serra, 352. 

San Buenaventura County. See Ventura County. 

San Buenaventura, battle of, 179. 



388 CALIFORNIA 

San Buenaventura mission, site selected, 59; foundation of, 84; estab- 
lishment delayed, 350. 

San Carlos mission, site selected, 59; foundation of, 72, 73, 101; Indians 
around, and Serra's work with, 73-74; removal to Carmel, 73-74; 
scenery of new site, 74-75; death of Father Serra at, 87; "Serra's 
tree" in Eoyal Chapel, 102'; Eoyal Chapel, 103; relics' in church of, 
103; first land grant given in California, 121. 

San Carlos presidio, "Eoyal presidio," 72. 

San Carlos, ship, sails for California, 63, 65; first to enter the Golden 
Gate, 80-81; arrival at Monterey flying the Mexican flag, 148. 

San Clemente Island, discovery of, 33; named San Salvador, 48. 

San Diego Bay, discovery of, 8-9; called San Miguel, 32; Viscaino at, 38; 
called San Mateo, 45-46; arrival of Portola at, 64; Landing of 
Galvez' expedition, 100; affair of the Lelia Byrd, 140; Captain 
Jedediah Smith sails from, 170. 

San Diego, during Mexican rule, 156. 

San Diego County, name and origin of, 317. 

San Diego mission, selection of site, 59; foundation of, 68; uprising of 
the Indians, 68; intention to abandon mission, 68-69; relief sent to, 
69-71; Gomez at, 71; Father Jayme killed at, 123. 

San Fernando College (Mexico), Serra and Palou at, 61-62; Palou retires 
to, 89. 

San Fernando mission, foundation of, 92. 

San Francisco Bay, passed undiscovered, 39; Indians around, 41-42; dis- 
covered by Portola, 67; named by Serra, 68; first ship to enter 
Golden Gate, 80-81; survey by Alberto de Cordoba, 133. 

San Francisco, settlers brought from Sinaloa to, 123; Dana's descrip- 
tion of, 154-155; condition in 1849, 220; effect of gold discovery on, 
221-223; influx of criminals in 1849 in, 231, 234-235; "Hounds," 
outrages by in, and how suppressed, 231-235; laws in 1849 in, 233-234; 
Vigilance Committee in, 235-237; assistance of, in building Central 
Pacific Eailroad, 282; destroyed hj earthquake and fire and rebuild- 
ing of, 299-301. 

San Francisco County, name and origin of, 317. 

San Francisco mission, foundation of, 80-81. 

San Francisco presidio, foundation of, 80. 

San Francisco Solano mission, foundation of, 93-94, 146; Eussians at, 94. 

San Gabriel mission, foundation of, 77-78; Indians at, 78; progress of, 
78; punishments for crimes at, 95; Captain Jedediah Smith at, 167. 

San Gabriel Eiver, battle of, 264. 

San Joaquin, name and origin of, 317, 

San Jos6, foundation of pueblo of, 118, 124, 125-126; population in 1800, 
138; condition during Mexican rule, 155-156; made capital, 273. 

San Jose mission, foundation of, 90; 169. 

San Juan Bautista mission, foundation and progress, 91. 

San Juan Capistrano mission, foundation ©f, 82; success of, 82; Indians 
of, 82; destroyed by earthquake, 82; sold, 97; Buenos Ayres in- 
surgents at, 147. 

San Lucas Islands. See Santa Eosa Island. 

San Luis Obispo, first tile manufactured in, 80. 

San Luis Obispo County, name and origin of, 318. 

San Luis Obispo mission, foundation of, 79-80. 

San Luis Eey mission, foundation of, 92-93; Indians of, 92; restoration 
of, 92-93; Mormon volunteers at, 269. 

San Mateo Bay. See San Diego Bay. 



INDEX 389 

San Mateo County, name and origin of, 318. 

San Miguel Bay, named, 32, 46-47; 317, 

San Miguel Island, 33, 52; Cabrillo's death on, 100. 

San Miguel mission, foundation of, 91; Father Lasuen's account of, 
91-92. 

San Nicolas, story of The Woman of, 43-45. 

San Pasqual, battle of, 257-262. 

San Pedro Harbor, discovered, 33; Buenos Ayres insurgents at, 147. 

San Pedro, Los Angeles and Salt Lake Eailroad. See Salt Lake Bail- 
road. 

San Eafael, General Castro at, 200; Kit Carson and Fremont at, S'OO. 

San Eafael Mission, foundation of, 93; established, 145. 

San Salvador. See San Clemente. 

Sanchez' saloon, bar painted by Tavernier and Frenzeny, 112-113. 

Santa Ana, General, decree of, in regard to Pious Fund, 334. 

Santa Barbara Channel Indians, 42; story of the "woman of San 
Nicolas," 43-45; superiority of, 85. 

Santa Barbara, location and climate of, 16-17; discovery of, 33; Buenos 
Ayres insurgents at, 147; during Mexican rule, 156; Captain Pedro 
Arguello at, 171-172. 

Santa Barbara County, name and origin of, 318. 

Santa Barbara mission, site of, 84; foundation of, 85; Indians of, 84-85; 
"sacred gardens" of, 86. 

Santa Barbara presidio, foundation of, 85. 

Santa Catalina Island, discovery of, 33; named La Vittoria, 48. 

Santa Clara College, 83-84. 

Santa Clara County, name and origin of, 318-319. 

Santa Clara mission, Bucareli orders foundation of, 80-81; foundation 
of, 83; Jesuits at, 83-84. 

Santa Clara Valley, 17-19, 49. 

Santa Cruz Island, discovery of, 33. 

Santa Cruz, during Mexican rule, 156. 

Santa Cruz County, name and origin of, 319. 

Santa Cruz mission, foundation of, 89-90. 

Santa Fe, New Mexico, establishment of, 294; trade with Kansas City, 
294; railroad from Kansas City to, 295. 

Santa Fe Eailroad, in California, 293-294; route from Santa Fe to Cali- 
fornia and through California, 295. 

Santa Fe trail, 294, 295. 

Santa Inez mission. See Santa Ynez mission. 

Santa Maria, Father Vicente, at San Francisco, 81. 

Santa Monica Bay, name, 48; Indians of, 48-49. 

Santa Eosa, ship of Buenos Ayres insurgents, 109. 

Santa Eosa Island, discovery of, 33, 52; called Las Islas de San Lucas, 52. 

Santa Ynez mission, foundation of, 93; restoration of, 93; attack on, by 
Indians, 165-166; Father Uria's defense against Indians, 165-166. 

Saravia, Father Tomas de la Pena, foundation of Santa Clara mission 
conducted by, 83; death of, 90. 

Savannah, U. fcj. frigate, at Monterey, 205. 

Scott, William, 206. 

Seal of California. See State seal. 

Sears, Mrs. John, assists in making Bear flag, 195. 

Secularization of missions. See Missions. 



390 CALIFORNIA 

Semple, Eobert, started " Calif ornian " newspaper, 111; in Bear Flag 
Eevolution, 192, 202'; chairman of convention for framing the con- 
stitution, 272. 

Sequoias, 40. 

Serra, Father Junipero, cross erected in memory of, on Mt. Kubidoux, 
13; connection with Jose Galvez, 56-59, 62, 63; sketch of life of, 
60-62; expedition to California, 62; in Mexico, 61-62; at San Diego, 
64, 65, 68-71, 117; accompanies Portola on his second expedition in 
search of Monterey, 71-72; foundation of San Carlos mission by, 72; 
work with the Indians, 73-74; return of, to San Carlos mission, 77; 
San Antonio de Padua mission founded by, 76-77; San Gabriel mis- 
sion founded by, 77-78; San Luis Obispo mission, founded by, 79-80; 
at San Francisco mission, 80-81; Santa Clara mission founded, 83; 
San Buenaventura, 84, 322; at Santa Barbara, 85; his last two years, 
86-87; death of, 87; result of his work, 87-88; grief of Indians upon 
death of, 88; his punishment of criminals, 95; why his work was 
successful, 98; dispute with military authority, 121; his relations 
with Governor de Neve, 124, 282, 283; first waterway in California 
projected by, 305; in California, 332-333; his most famous walk, 
349-354; statement to Viceroy Bucareli in regard to state of mis- 
sions in California, 351-354; charges against Comandante Fages, 
352'; grave of, 363-366; official record of the death of, 364-365. 

''Serra Tree," story of, 102. 

Seven Cities of Cibola. See Cibola, seven cities of. 

Shasta County, name and origin of, 319. 

Shelvocke, Captain George, voyage of, 37. 

Sherman, William Tecumseh, story of Senorita Bonifacio and, 110-111. 

Sherwood, W. S., 356. 

Shubrick, W. Branford, arrival at Monterey, 269; succeeded by Com- 
modore Biddle, 269. 
Sierra County, name and origin of, 319. 
Sierra Gorda mission, Serra at, 61-62. 

Sierra Mountains, difficulties in building railroad across, 286-289. 
Sinaloa, settlers brought from to San Francisco, 123. 
Sir Francis Drake Bay. See Drake's Bay. 
Siskiyou County, name and origin of, 319-320. 
Sitjar, Father Buenaventura, at San Miguel mission, 92. 
Six Callieux, Ford on Umpqua Eiver, 320. 
Slavery, danger of California becoming a slave state, 272. 

Sloat, John D., arrival at Monterey of, 205; instructions to, from United 
States government, 205, 239-240; his indecision in regard to 
Fremont, 205-206; United States flag raised at Monterey under, 110, 
239; his letters to General Castro and Pio Pico, 240; proclamation 
of, 240-243; Pico's failure to answer letter of, 243; Castro's evasive 
reply, 243; transference of authority to Stockton, 243; his protest 
to Secretary of Navy against Stockton's address, 244. 

Sluice, as mining appliance, 228. 

Smith, Azariah, 217. 

Smith, Jedediah, leads first American overland expedition to California, 
166; unwelcome reception, 167-168; failure to leave California, 168- 
169; letter to Father Duran, 169; departure from California, 169, 
170; return to California, 170; arrest of and final departure, 170-171. 

Snyder, Jacob K., 320, 357. 



INDEX 391 

Sola, Pablo Vicente de, his defense against Buenos Ayres insurgents, 
109-110; Ms opposition to Mexican revolution, 142-143; his trip 
from Mexico to Monterey and his welcome, 143-145; as governor, 
145; his troubles with foreigners, 145-146; establishments of mis- 
sions under, 145-146; letter from Luis Arguello to, against Kus- 
sians, 146; defense against Buenos Ayres insurgents at Santa Bar- 
bara, 147; at San Pedro, 147; transference of California to Mexican 
rule, 148-149. 

Solano County, nam© and origin of, 320. 

Solano Mission. See San Francisco Solano mission. 

Solars, building lots in pueblos, 126. 

Soledad Mission, foundation of, 90; death of Father Sarria at, 90. 

Soler, Pablo, surgeon and physician, 128. 

Somera, Father Angel, at founding of San Gabriel mission, 77-78; 350. 

Songs, in mining camps, 237-2,'38; official song of Native Sons of the 
Golden West, 237-238. 

Sonoma, captured by Americans and Bear Flag hoisted, 185, 192, 193, 
194, 195; Mexican military garrison at, 191; Bear flag replaced by 
United States flag, 207. 

Sonoma County, name and origin of, 320. 

Sonoma Mission. See San Francisco Solano mission. 

Sonora, trail blazed by Anza from, to Monterey, 123. 

Soto, Antonio, commander of troops against Indian revolt, 181-182. 

Spain, Mexican revolution against, 141-142. 

Spanish Era in California, 117-150; why the Spanish were unprogressive 
commercially, 278-279. 

Spikes, on Central Pacific railroad, 290. 

Stanford, Leland, 282; member of the Central Pacific company, 284-285; 
governor of California and Senator from, 284; founding of the 
University, 284; 2'90, 293. 

Stanislaus County, name and origin of, 320-321. 

State seal of California, designed by Major Garnett, description of, 274; 
355-359. 

Stearns, Abel, expatriated, 174. 

Sterling, ship, 251. 

Stevenson, Jonathan D., arrival of first detachment of a regiment, 269- 
270. 

Stevenson, Sobert Louis, life at Monterey, 112-114. 

Stockton, Kobert F., arrival at Monterey and Sloat's transfer of au- 
thority to, 243; address to people of California, 243-244; Sloat ob- 
jects to address, 244; disregards Larkin's advice, 244; his refusal to 
negotiate with Flores, 244-245, 263; at San Pedro, 244; in posses- 
sion of Los Angeles, 2'45; declares himself Governor of California 
and appoints Fremont military commander, 246; returns to Monterey, 
246; General Kearney's message to, 252-253; his march from San 
Diego towards Los Angeles and fight on San Gabriel Eiver, 262-264; 
again takes possession of Los Angeles, 265; letter to Fremont from, 
265-266; his relations with General Kearney, 267-268; Fremont's 
acknowledgment of his authority, 268-269; leaves California, 271. 

Stockton (city), 231, 235. 

Storm, Peter, his part in making Bear flag, 195. 

Suertes, lots for cultivation in pueblos, 12'6. 

Sutter, John A., contract with James W. Marshall, 213-214; Marshall's 
interview with in regard to discovery of gold, 216-217; 321. 

Sutter County, name and origin, 321. 



392 CALIFORNIA 

Sutter's Fort, prisoners in, during Bear Flag Eevolution, 192; Mexican 
flag replaced by Bear flag, 194-196; Bear flag replaced by United 
States fltig, 206. 

Swift, G. P., 195. 

Tavernier, paints bar of Sanchez' saloon, 112-113. 

Tehama County, name and origin of, 321. 

Thornton, Sir Edward, 840. 

Tiles, manufacture of first, at San Luis Obispo, 80. 

Todd, "William L., artist of Bear flag and his description of flag, 195-196. 

Tonopah Railroad. See Las Vegas and Tonopah Railroad. 

Trade. See Commerce and trade. 

Transportation. See Railroads. 

Treaties, Cahuenga, 266-267; Guadalupe Hidalgo, 271. 

Trees, sequoias, 40; "Serra tree," 102; oaks at Monterey, 102; first 
orange, 299. 

Trinity County, name and origin of, 321. 

Truckee, difficulties in construction railroad from Emigrant Gap to, 
286-2'87. 

Tulare County, name and origin of, 321. 

Tuolumne County, name and origin of, 321. 

"Two years before the mast," description of pueblos in, 153-155; de- 
scription of San Francisco, 154-155. 

Ugarte, Father Juan, 330-331. 

Unicorns, 28-29. 

Union Pacific Railroad, vice-president of, 290. 

United States Senators, William M. Gwin, 273; Fremont elected, 273; 

Stanford elected, 284. 
Urdenata, Andreas de, 278. 
Uria, Father Francisco Xavier, his defense of Santa Ynez mission against 

Indians, 165-166. 

Valencia, Gabriel, 336. 

Vallejo, capital of California, 273. 

Vallejo, Ignacio, Governor Fages letter to, 128. 

Vallejo, Maria Antonio Lugo de, 160-161. 

Vallejo, Mariano G., character of, 179-180; prisoners sent by Castro to, 

180; cruel treatment of Indians by, 181-182; his attitude during 

the Bear Flag Revolution, 185; taken prisoner at Fort Sutter, 185; 

in charge of Sonoma garrison, 191-192; 356. 
Vallejo, Salvador, massacre of Indians by, 182-183; taken prisoner, 192. 
Vancouver, George, in Monterey harbor, 132; meeting between Governor 

Borica and, 132; Governor Arrillaga's attitude toward, 129. 
Vandalis, ship, 251. 
Varela, Serbulo, leads attack against Americans in Los Angeles, 246-251; 

his pronunciamento, 247-249. 
Vasquez, Tiburcio, 104. 
Ventura County, Spanish grant given to Picos in, 158; name and origin 

of, 322. 
Verdugo, Jose Maria, his Spanish grant, 158. 
Viceroys of New Spain. See under: Branciforte, Marques de; Bueareli, 

Antonio Maria; Croix, Marques de; Zuniga, Gaspar de. 



INDEX • 393 

Victoria, Manue!, as governor, 174-177; pronunciamento against, 174-175- 
^f i°i.f ® ,-^2^*1"^ marches to Los Angeles against, 175-176; result 
of fight, 176-177. 

Vigilance Committee, organized in San Francisco, 235-287; official declar- 
ation of, 367-368; names of, of San Francisco, 368. 

Vigilantes, lidt of names of, 368-369. 

Villa, Vicente, commander of ship San Carlos, sails for California, 63- 
at San Diego mission, 71. 

Viscaino, Juan, sails on ship San Antonio for California, 63 

Viscaino, Sebastian, 31; expedition to California, 38-40; reaches San 
iJiego, 38, 317; at Santa Catalina, 38; at Monterey, 39. 100 102- 
his map, 58, 59, 71, 315; names Santa Barbara, 318 ' 

Visitador-general. See Galvez, Jos6 de. 

Vittoria (afterwards Santa Catalina), named, 48. 

Vizcaino. See Viscaino. 

Warner's ranch, General Kearney at, 256. 
Washington navel, how brought to California, 299. 
Water Ways. See under Serra, Father. — Owens Eiver Aqueduct. 
Western Pacific Eailroad, acquired by "Big Four," 293; 295. 
"What the Engines Said," Bret Harte's poem in celebration of com- 
pletion of Central Pacific Eailroad, 291-293. 
Wheat, cropi in 1868, 281. 

Wimmer, Mrs. Jane, her account of discovery of gold. 215-216 
Wimmer, Peter L., 214. 

"Woman of San Nicolas," legend of, 43-45. 
Workman, William, 263. 
Wozencraft, O. M., 356. 
Wright, George W., elected to Congress, 273. 

Yerba Buena, meaning of the word, 221. See also, San Francisco. 
Yolo County, name and origin of 322. 
Yuba County, name and origin of, 322. 

Zamorano, Augustin, his marriage, 173. 
Zanjero, William Mulholland as, in Los Angeles, 303-304. 
Zuniga, Caspar de, Conde de Monterey, viceroy of New Spain, Monterey 
named in his honor, 100, 315. 



